


A Twin for a Twin

by Frenzi99



Category: Transformers (Bayverse)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Crime, Friendship, G1 character, Gen, minor Ocean's 11 crossover
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-09-08
Updated: 2011-03-09
Packaged: 2017-10-11 14:27:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 165,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/113431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frenzi99/pseuds/Frenzi99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Skyler gets an unlikely request by authorities to repaint a stolen car just as he was about to leave town to search for his missing brother. He never expected to be kidnapped by it, and find it was an alien robot. What? It's searching for its twin?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 'Pimp My Ride' Con Man, Distressed Egoistic Warrior Mech

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Science and Fiction](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/1400) by Faecat. 



> Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. And I don't own Ocean's 11 either. While this is not a crossover, I only borrow the characters from Ocean's group for side purposes to link to my OC's life. I don't own anything that's copyrighted either. I own my plot and OCs.
> 
> Note: This fic is on FFnet as well. I am the original author of this fic, thus I will link my profile here and on FFnet. I do not plagiarize. Original first chapter posted on 5-24-10 (FFnet).
> 
> The format is inspired by Faecat's story Science and Fiction on FFnet; however I going to try something different with both OC and Autobot view of their day. I don't think about an OC being a con man has been tried before (I'm not sure either), but it's been an idea stuck in my mind for a good long while. Especially when it comes to one of the major twins (G1 twins), Sunstreaker (G1 character). This happens after the events of '09. I just had to write it out.
> 
> Mind my grammar if it's clumsy or I do make mistakes, English is my second language. I have two Beta Readers, Khalthar and LunaeShark to check this and there are slang uses in this fic that are frequent.
> 
> Well, enjoy the ride!

 

* * *

**~ Chapter 1: 'Pimp My Ride' Con Man, Distressed Egoistic Warrior Mech ~**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 1.01: Missing and… a Stolen Car?_

_Town outside of New Orleans, Louisiana, US._

_I called up Uncle Rob/Bob to find he was off on a job in Washington. I suppose the Bureau has been busy these days so that he forgot to leave a message to me he'd be absent for the next few weeks. He was probably my only blood related uncle I could call now, but it seemed I was out of luck. None of my other relatives were in the state either._

_So instead I called 'Uncle D' today to hear him tell me that he had a 'Mark' on a certain government official D.G. with his shills. It was obvious he was going to be busy for the next long con, that I didn't have the heart to tell him my younger twin brother was missing. I had lost contact with Steve for over a month and had been trying to get back in touch with no success as he lived in Kansas City and I lived in a small town somewhere in Louisiana or about a state away. _

_Like any older brother (even if it was only by 7 minutes), I was worried and set out to find him. I had everything ready to go, until Officer Reed came to me and said the police had found a stolen car. He wanted me to do a paint job on it as it was in a wreck, and he simply didn't want any trouble facing some rich guy or whoever owned it yapping at him about insurance and blaming the police department for the damage._

_Well I did owe Reed a couple of times a while back, so, I agreed. What I didn't expect was that it was one HELL of a sports car. Now I understood why he gave it to me to do the job. The others had denied Reed completely, they didn't want to risk in getting into trouble (paint costs and who'd be responsible if they screwed up) and there was little chance to find another person in town who had my expertise. _

_So, he managed to tow the car to Bill's garage and let me do the work. But he actually warned me that there were some weird problems with the car. _

_That at some points it would seem to come to life and suddenly just stay silent. _

_The tow truck man said it was rather… spooky. _

_~ Sky_

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

Skyler Knight was a young man with many talents. Many of course had known him and dubbed him as the 'Pimp My Ride' dude, and he was known throughout the town as a person who did amazing paint jobs and fixes on cars. With dark brown spiky hair and cobalt blue eyes, he was tall, yet rather lean and had a decent build, not much to intimidate anyone but he easily blended in with the rest of society. Skyler preferred it that way, and it was safer that way.

His family name 'Knight' was another identity he came to embrace since he was young. His father had always reminded him when he was little that it was important to play the role and it just sounded cool. Considering he was still just 4 at the time, he took it with no hesitation. Now he was older, and he understood that his father and pretty much the rest of his family weren't very normal for that matter. And family also counted the numerous adopted 'uncles' and 'aunts' that had no family blood ties.

Long story short, his 'family' is an integrated group of Con Men and shills (accomplices).

Also known to be the scammers of humanity who were behind most, if not, all the high-end heists, thievery, and frauds. But his family's circles of friends were considered to be the top rulers or one that had famous if not infamous individuals. One of them in particular was Daniel Ocean, whom Sklyer and Steve had always known as 'Uncle D'. In 2001 he committed the best if not craziest and most stunning heists of all time, robbing three casinos in Los Vegas which were the Bellagio, the Mirage, and the MGM Grand with about $150 million out the door.

Though true that they were people who stole and scammed, there were rules set by the group. That the people, who they set as the target or 'Mark', were greedy, dishonest, and any person who had had the kind of power that they trampled upon the weaker. Ruthless drug dealers, casino owners, greedy businessmen, and even the egocentric hotel owners were their targets. It was a thrill to exploit the weak minded as long they weren't so good themselves, or as the saying goes in the Con man world, "You can't cheat an honest man."

Skyler was smart and well aware that he still had a lot to learn, but he had managed to do some short cons himself a few times without getting busted from the cops. He had built links of people across a few states that he could trust who had their own specialties and had taken a lot of knowledge like a sponge from his so-called 'uncles' and 'aunts'.

_Now, back to macro…_

On that very week, Skyler had been intent on leaving the town for good. He resigned from his job at Bill's Emporium Car Garage as the head paint job designer and manager, had his apartment emptied, and he prepared to even as to take the fastest plane trip, train, bus, or whatever available transport that would get him to Kansas City yesterday if possible. Being a son of con man also had its disadvantages as his dad did make a few enemies along his lofty career, and Skyler was worried that Steve's disappearance might be connected to one of his dad's former enemies.

Yet, 'funny' fate had other plans for him.

Just as he was about leave, Officer Reed called him to say he was in dire need with a car that needed a serious paint job; even though the cop was aware that Skyler had quit from where he was working. Bill even went to the point of actually telling him that he could use the paint and facilities at his garage, that food and even his hotel/motel money would be taken care of. With those two acting that way, there was no way of leaving the town without a decent fight. Curious and highly suspicious, Skyler went to the garage to see the car that the two were raving about. And when he did…

Skyler felt like someone had just yanked a carpet from beneath his feet.

The car was a yellow LP 570-4 Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera that just recently been released in March 2010. Considered to be the lightweight of its class and fastest current Gallardo production model to date. While Skyler had 'uncles' and 'aunts' who had several of their own top rides, he was never happier than to see this one up close and personal. If only it didn't look as it did right now.

It was in a state of _crap shit_.

He realized that he was in for a long job.

"Hell, Reed didn't say it was this ******** trashed!" He exclaimed as he started inspecting the exterior of the sports car. "I'm starting to doubt if I'm actually going to be doing the job as charity," Skyler scratched his head in slight regret.

Covered in scratches, dents, dirt, and mud; the paint was in such a bad condition it looked like parts of it had peeled off. It was as if the car had gone into a war zone or something. Skyler was very amused and somewhat convinced that maybe the car was parked at the wrong place at the wrong time in some Hollywood action movie set. _Maybe it was parked in a James Bond one…that should explain a whole lot._ Then it had gotten stolen by some car maniac who happened to be around the place. That could also explain the few places where the paint looked like it was burnt from explosions or the fact that it had smoke dust covered all over on the hood and that the police didn't want the trouble to go to just another ordinary paint job guy.

Not to mention the fact it had been stolen. Who wouldn't be _furious_ when a car like _that_ was stolen?

He was to the point of thinking of ditching the job and making a run for it.

Yet, Skyler was just too proud to run away from the job. To him, fixing any sort of paint job that required his hands to make it better and making it look like a 'wow' factor shackled his feet to the ground. The state of the car in front of him just screamed at him that it was his responsibility to get it back to be good as new. He somewhat cursed it that he'd inherited the trait from his dad of never running from a chance to knock people off their feet when it came to a job, especially one that he was so passionate about. Steve for one also had inherited said trait, and Skyler knew that Steve would probably pester him for months if he quit the task just like that.

So, with every single cleaning utensil he had on hand, he set out to do his job. Skyler went to his first phase of his task, which was getting the car cleaned, and with a water jet pump going at room temperature, he started to soak the car carefully, making sure everything that was mostly visible and looked like dirt came off. He went so far as inspecting the interior to find it was unscathed. Confused, he shrugged it off. He wasn't an expert mechanic or someone who was an expert in car interior either. The fact that the car was still in one piece was more than enough for him to fix it up even if it looked very fishy.

As he wiped off the front, he found a somewhat odd mark that looked like a square-like face in red where the usual Lamborghini logo should be.

Skyler paused as he looked at it.

He couldn't really imagine anyone actually requesting the company logo to be peeled out or anything. The paint job con man figured maybe its owner was a custom freak or something. Then, as the bottom side of the front door of the car came into view as the sand came out, the place where it should have the metallic text 'Superleggera' something else was written instead.

'_Sunstreaker' _

The young man blinked a couple of times as he thought it over. _Definitely a custom freak and that was probably what the owner named this car._ Skyler shook his head a couple of times. Well, it wasn't in his place to criticize anything that didn't belong to him. But at least it did give him a solid clue as to what type paint and design that would please the owner if he was looking for it and expecting it to be back in one piece after all the crap it went through. In its current state the car's yellow color looked hideous, some parts of it were pale yellow and while in other areas the scratches were just so severe that it looked whitish yellow with bits of orange.

"So you're Sunstreaker, huh?" Skyler said as he scrubbed the text, making sure all the dust and dirt came out.

There was a sudden jerky movement that looked like the car shuddered and its wheels started to roll back. Sklyer in panic mode went to the rear of the car and stopped it before it could crash to the wall. He didn't need any more damage and scratches on the car! Damn it! He sighed in a great relief as the car finally came to a halt. But afterward, he wasted no time to check through the windows that the main brakes had been in place.

For some reason he now felt spooked out.

_There was no friggin' way the car moved on its own right?_

The young man was starting to get goose bumps; he was very sure he had set the brakes to lock AND made sure they were working when the car came into the garage. Skyler then remembered what the car pick-up man had said about how the car was behaving oddly… like it was possessed or something, coming alive on its own. This time he shook his head violently to dismiss it.

"I must be dreaming or something…" Skyler muttered in no one particular. "I guess I should hit the sack after I'm done cleaning. The paint job will have to wait for tomorrow." He looked at the wall clock indicating that it was 1 in the morning. It was 2 am when he was finally satisfied that he'd cleaned everything. While there was a couch in the room, Skyler was not planning to get spooked out on whatever time he had left till morning to sleep. He made sure that everything was in place and pushed the car into a lock stand and clamped it up three feet above the ground so it wouldn't move anywhere. While it might seem a bit paranoid, he just didn't want to add more damage to the car.

He closed the garage, retired for the night, and his footsteps were sluggish on the way to the hotel.

Skyler looked to the night sky hoping that his brother was going to survive another week without him.

_Hang in there, Steve. I'll find you when I get there, no matter what._

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

With the whole building finally empty, the Lambo car revved its engine and vented out with strange noises of sonorous sounds that would have confused the human ear.

But for any Cybertronian it was full of curses, anger, and growls.

That had been way too close. He'd nearly got himself caught. Not to mention he was locked up off the ground in his alt-mode!

Sunstreaker couldn't help but let out every single thing he had pent up those few days. He was frustrated and even to the point that he was real furious being towed away by organic fleshlings. Anger management was never his thing, and the fact he had his communicator and navigation systems completely wiped out in the fight two days ago did not help at all in his mission to get to the Autobots. Knowing the D'Con he'd fought was still alive was another blow to his pride. Plus, being dirty, soaked with mud, and basically lots of organic matter in most of his body had made him go into a fit that nearly put his disguise on the line. The fleshling who was called the 'truck man' was rough at handling, and managed to add more scratches on his already horrible looking exterior. Making the man scared out of his mind was probably the best thing Sunstreaker could have done in getting the fleshling to pay for his actions.

He sighed. At least the current fleshing was more subtle, Sunny was actually surprised that all the dirt that was in parts that were difficult to clean out was gone through its thorough cleaning. However he was still worried about the paint job that the little puny thing was going to do in the morning. Considering his current situation, he was disdainfully stuck in his alt-mode and in no position to move at all or change into his bi-pedal mode without arousing suspicion as it would be impossible to get back on the stand without literally breaking it. There was no way of escaping what the fleshing would probably do to him in the next few hours or so. Sunstreaker made a note that if the organic didn't do a good paint job, he'd make sure the little critter would dearly pay.

The mech's thoughts soon trailed off to his missing twin Sideswipe, which still left a horrible pain in his spark. Sunny had closed off their link for his younger twin's safety. At the battle of Tyger Pax he had managed to make sure his twin would leave towards wherever their leader was heading in chasing the All Spark. They were severely outnumbered, but he had stayed behind to take on whatever Decepticon stood in his way and somehow he had been captured. The only thing that kept him alive was the knowledge Sideswipe was waiting somewhere for him, but though he wanted to reunite with his twin again, he didn't want his brother to know he was in pain.

The hideous Soundwave had tampered with the bond he had with Sideswipe, so that anything exchanged between them was set to inflict incredible amounts of pain instead of comfort. It was basically having a time bomb in his body that was connected to his brother through him. Sunny wasn't going to let the D'Con get the pleasure of killing them both, so he made sure that Sides knew he couldn't feel him, but would at least know that he was alive or hope that he was still around. The only way he could probably undo it was to find Ratchet - as much as he loathed the medic with every fiber of his being, he didn't necessarily hate the mech.

Somehow, Sunstreaker had managed to barely escape and headed into space to join with the others after receiving a message coming from some far away planet called 'Earth'.

Earth of course had been full of surprises for him. The initial message sent by Optimus Prime was surprising, on how a fleshling had taken down, not just any Decepticon, but Megatron himself. The second message told of the Fallen being on Earth and how he was also stopped, once again with the help of the organics. Sunstreaker had no idea what made these little things such a threat to the Decepticons. Perhaps it was just best to know that they were on their side. Still, the fact that Earth was wet, filled with dirt, and other organic matters didn't exactly make it welcoming for him.

His current state was also depressing for the bot. Even if it was probably no where near what Ratchet could do with his flying wrenches, he utterly had no clue as to where he could find his comrades now that everything that linked to them was gone and he couldn't even get into the fleshy's network that they were raving about called the internet! _Pathetic._ He had only remembered briefly about how there was a base of operations they had in Nevada. He had no idea where he was now, and certainly there was no other mech around to show him the way.

_Pit, don't tell me I have to get a 'fleshy' pet to show me the way._

Sunny growled at the thought. He certainly had no other options. But as long as this was for Sides, he didn't have any other choice.

Now the question was… which fleshling was he going to acquire?

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 1.01: Lost and A Plan_

_Planet Earth, some fleshling town._

_Stuck on a rock full of organic matter is real slag. Dirt, moisture, and the whole slagging muck was enough to really make me want to leave the planet. I wasn't sure that Sides was on this planet because I've been closing the bond ever since that son of a glitch Soundwave did that thing. I was only sure that Optimus was here with a few Autobots fighting the D'Cons. At least it was a way for me to find out if my twin was here. If he wasn't I was going to go to Hatchet and get the bond fixed, then continue searching for Sides. I didn't care about the fighting as long Sides wasn't around. It's been too long without him, and I had to reconnect to him somehow. _

_Now that was fraggin' problem I had now. I am LOST and I HATE to admit it, but I had to somehow get a squishy or organic or whatever you called it to show me the way to get to Nevada. As much as there were so many of them I could simply pluck one out of their pack on the road or literally anywhere around the city, but I wasn't keen on getting one like the 'pickup truck man' squishy or the 'officer' one. Pit, I'm not going to pickup a femme either! _

_I needed someone who was aware of how things worked around here but no where near to the system or military people who weren't part of the Autobot supporter group that Big Boss mentioned. Problem is I have to stalk around a bit longer if I was to find one. Slag it. _

_I don't even know the one I pick up would be tolerable to my optics. _

_I'm STILL not looking forward to the paint job in a few hours more! _

_~ Sunny _

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

**TBC...**


	2. A Short Con for the Weekend, Fleshling to be Abducted Confirmed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who want to know:
> 
> What is Con man/Con Artist?
> 
> Your expert scammer/thief or a person who is an expert at fooling people by using a 'confidence trick'. Basically, confidence tricks exploit typical human qualities such as greed, dishonesty, vanity, honesty, compassion, credulity and naïveté. For many, they usually live double lives. Hence my OC, he hides himself as the paint job guy.
> 
> A Short Con is a scam done in a short time without much planning or spontaneously on spot (basically street theft, cheating in a poker game, etc.). Usually it can be done alone or up to 3 people.
> 
> A Long Con on the other hand can take months of preparation, but usually get larger rewards (e.g. stealing from a casino or bank, staging fraud transactions, etc.). It takes a crew of 4 or more to make it work, thus the time of preparation.
> 
> Here my friends, I'll give you guys and gals a look on a short con.
> 
> Enjoy the ride!

 

* * *

**~ Chapter 2: A Short Con for the Weekend, Fleshling to be Abducted Confirmed ~**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 1.02: A Pill of Ecstasy for Depression_

_Town outside of New Orleans, Louisiana, US._

_I had that dream again that morning._

_The very same dream when Steve and I were 17, and had been told by the police that our parents and our younger sister, Scarlet, were killed in the first wave of the terrorist attack at Mission City. The feeling of pain, the loss, and the sorrow resurfaced again…and the words that would always repeat over and over again from everyone's mouth…_

'_We're sorry for your loss.'_

_I never would have believed that they could die because of terrorists, neither did Steve. When you've lived in a family of Con artists and thieves for most of your life, the government was always the number one suspect of covering up things and sweeping them under the carpet. The traces of specks were only visible to the eyes of the trained and not the public. There wasn't much we could do. _

_Uncle Robert probably took my dad's death the hardest. He was the eldest and felt that he failed his youngest brother. So, the both of us were taken in and we were taught in everything that he knew. Short hands, bar bets, weaponry, diversions, disguises, short cons, long cons and pretty much everything he could think of while getting us ready for the real world. He even went far as getting us tutors in whatever we had a knack for, that’s the reason why we never got into college in the first place._

_Eventually, Steve and I went our separate ways, not out of spite, but we agreed that it was time to grow up and take on the world. Now I was starting to regret that decision. We should have stayed together like our parents had always told us. I couldn't afford to lose the last part of my real family I had left. _

_Depressed, lonely, and still thinking warily on the paint job I had to finish, breakfast was gloomy despite the good food, at least until a familiar face came in - Dexter. Two magical words popped out of his mouth that made the week sound a little more exciting…_

'_Short Con.'_

_Well, why not? A little fun couldn't hurt. _

_Or so I thought._

_~ Sky _

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

"Who's the _mark_, Dex?"

A young thin blond man with turquoise eyes simply placed down the photo in front of Skyler as they were sitting on the chairs at the table of his hotel room.

Skyler raised an eyebrow, "Your going for Mikey Hills." _It wasn't a question._

"Yup. A businessman and apparently a sketchy loan shark who gets his victims by making fake contracts, likes to show off his money. Fortunately for us, not smart and perverted," Dexter said off the top of his head.

"He never has bodyguards around him considering he's a walrus," Sklyer commented at the photo. "Just you and me?"

"You, me, and Catherine," the informant corrected.

"Cathy's here?"

"She's in town, met her the other day. It was actually her idea." _He was smiling like hell froze over._

Skyler couldn't help but laugh, "I wouldn't have doubted her for a second! With a cousin like that, she'll be inheriting your family legacy of con artists."

Dexter shrugged. "I don't mind. I like her style, always a leap ahead of the victim."

"You're just not the idea man are you?" Skyler joked.

"Stop pushing buttons, Sky," the thin guy irritably said as he ignored the last question. "Ok, time, place, roles, and things to do…"

"I thought this was a short con?"

"Short as in it'll last for a few seconds… She's a bit of a perfectionist." Dexter said distantly. "This weekend 9 sharp, morning, city central park. You're our 'transport'. All you have to do is take a tour guide with the third group coming to the Mayor's speech on the seminar for sustainable development for the environment. The place is gonna be packed, so our exit strategy is going to be easier."

"I heard about it, awards to businessman for the eco friendly development when they are actually the main cause of it. Wonderful. So, what we're getting is…?" Skyler trailed off.

Dexter smiled, "His thick wallet. Cathy managed to heat him up a little as he likes to show off, so it's gonna be full on that day. Cathy's your tourist guide so Mikey kinda wants to show off that he could pull out a big tip, I'm the chaos bringer, and you know the drill."

"Magnet, switch-a-roo, transit, bring out the chaos, and make our lofty escape plan? Not bad." Skyler nodded. "I'm in. So how much are we talking about in this wallet of his?"

"About nine grand or 9k!" Dexter raised both of his thumbs up. "Don't ask how he does it; I heard it's a new type of thick wallet these days. We split it three ways it's 3k each." _Pretty much with a cherry on top._

"Sweet, it'll probably cover costs where I'm heading," Skyler said, yet the enthusiasm was absent.

Dexter looked concerned, "You got any word from Steve yet?"

"No… not a clue," Skyler sighed. "Checked his friends and everything as well. Nothing at all."

"Sorry, man."

"Don't worry about it. I'll find him somehow. So… you're heading to Vegas by plane after the short con?" Skyler changed the subject.

"Yeah." Dexter then gave Skyler an assuring pat on the shoulder. "Uncle Reuben's around. I'll make sure to pass on the info; maybe I'll get in contact with uncle Rusty. I'll tell them you'll be searching for Steve."

"Thanks, it's a weight of my back."

"Don't you have job to get back to?" Dexter inquired. "Paint job?"

"Yup. And it's one _hell_ of a car." _That was an understatement though._

"Type?"

"A Lambo, Gallardo Superleggera, 2010 model."

Dexter gaped, "NO WAY!"

"Way. If it wasn't in a mess it would have looked really epic," Skyler commented. "I need to buy the paints, the wax, and everything first before I get back. None of the stuff Bill's got is suitable for it."

"Can I come?" the other asked with puppy eyes.

Skyler looked at his friend skeptically.

"No?" Dexter asked.

Skyler was silent.

"A little peek?"

No answer.

Dexter grumbled as he gave up, "Fine, I'm not coming. It's still a cool car."

"I just don't want to give you any ideas, Dex." Skyler explained. "Trust me; Officer Reed has a sharp eye on it. You're better off not looking for trouble while he's on the job. We're actually lucky he isn't on the job when we do the short con."

"A photo?"

"DEX!"

_Much later on… _

With a lot of suggesting and tons more blackmailing, Skyler had finally gotten Dexter off the idea getting near the Lambo car. He was starting to regret telling his giddy partner-in-crime when the situation happened to be on super sports cars especially. It was a note he would keep in his head not to say something like that in front of Dexter again. Simply because: Awesome sports car + Hyper Dexter = A ton of trouble.

And Skyler had seen enough of it through his 'uncles' and 'aunts'. _Period._

While they had been friends since they were little, Dexter still had the bad habit of over reacting… even if he was now 23 and older by 2 years than Steve (21) or Skyler (21). Many members of the elder ones of the con artists were still wary of letting him into any heists, well, not that Dexter wasn't good at things; his demeanor just didn't suit the long cons well where you needed a lot of patience and control.

Skyler sighed and kept walking. As he did so, he went back to looking into his shopping bags of supplies, making sure he had everything that he needed. He was pushing his _former_ boss' budget a bit, but for a sports car like the one they had in the garage; well, it wasn't exactly a normal car in terms of maintenance. It was pretty impressive that he was able to see one in the first place; something like it was bought straight off the market on the day it was sold. As Skyler made it back to the garage now opened for business, he saw Officer Reed and Bill inspecting the car.

Without delay, Skyler hastened his steps to greet them.

* * *

Still helpless in his parked state on the stand and in alt-form, Sunstreaker was now expecting the worst. It was inevitable as he was going to get his paint job, and this 'Bill' squishy made it far worse by showing the can of paints that would look horrific on his exterior. _Pit, he was going to be painted LIME GREEN for Primus' sakes!_ Sunny now swore that if he ended up in that color, he was going to murder the organic in his recharge! He wasn't going to care if he'd get stuck in the brig forever by disobeying Prime's laws of never killing an organic when it came to his exterior. _Slag it!_

Luckily, a certain paint job guy showed up.

"Bill? Reed?" Skyler asked. "What's going on?"

"You did a great job kiddo," Bill complimented. "Pretty amazing how you cleaned it up and got all those dents out just fine. Couldn't expect better of ya."

Skyler mouth hit the floor. "What?"

As the young man inspected the car the dents that he was sure he’d left last night to find that they were gone. He only cleaned the car and Bill was always the first one to be around the place. No one could have un-dented it. If a guy wanted to steal a car he wouldn't un-dent it and still leave it here! _Unless the car itself did it._ His face paled, this car wasn't just spooky anymore…it was now on the X-Files level!

"Son? You alright?" Reed asked worriedly.

He recovered quickly, "U-um, y-yeah." Skyler instantly went into thinking up a diversion. "Did you find out the owner?"

Officer Reed paused for a moment before he answered, "Well, there was an owner of the same type of car like this just east of Louisiana. But his was red and it wasn't missing. He doesn't know any owner of these types of cars in the state, said he was the only one."

_That was just way too suspicious._

"Maybe it's owner-less?" Skyler suggested. "It doesn't have any ID or number. Or it was new and it got stolen and-"

"Boy! You bought more paint?" Bill interrupted. "I thought we made a deal to use the paint from my garage!"

Skyler rolled his eyes, "Come on Bill. Seriously; a car like this with 2nd rate paint? You got to be joking!" When a better inspection of the paint was laid out, the paint job man gave him a disappointed look. "Lime green?"

Reed only looked at Bill with apprehension very much indicating that he agreed with the young man.

While nobody was looking at the car, the tires slightly (not attracting the human eye) let some air out. It was like letting out some relief.

"It's an attractive color!" Bill pressed.

"It's not the original color of whoever owned it," Skyler pointed out the obvious with a bored look.

Bill wanting to make a comeback then said, "There's plenty of yellows out there, what happens if it's the wrong shade?"

Attentively, Skyler pointed him to the right place to search for answers, "Look, whoever owns this car customized it well. See over there? Its name is 'Sunstreaker'. The basic logic for the car's original color would be 'Sunny' yellow. Not some lime green…"

For the first time on this planet, Sunstreaker the warrior Autobot was impressed with this certain organic. He silently applauded the organic who rescued him from turning green and spotting his original color. _Thank Primus!_

At first Bill wasn't going to let it go. Yet, with a good glare from the 'boy' he called in front of him that said clearly, 'I know what I'm doing and I _WILL_ quit the job if you don't let me' look, Bill gave up. "Alright, Sky. You win." And with that, the owner of the garage left without another word.

Officer Reed of course only laughed through the last sentence, "You really hit on him with that one, kiddo."

"Hey! It comes with job." Skyler protested. "No paint job person can be the best without knowing their owners or at least trying to find out a bit about them when you customize their car. Car exteriors are personal because it shows you who they are."

"Deep kid, pretty deep words," the cop commented. "But your work is the best around. I wouldn't be surprised if you got a job with the professionals if you were in Los Angeles. Ever thought about joining in the Galpin Auto Sports or West Coast Customs? Best of the best, and the perfect place for a passionate paint job guy like you."

"Sometimes I do," Skyler sighed. "Maybe after I visit Kansas City I might."

_His brother had to come first._

"Well kid, go for it. I'll be rooting for you," Reed cheered. "Gotta go back, got a patrol shift right now. You better get to your job. Later, Sky."

"See ya, Reed." The young man went to his supplies and started to mark the scratches around the car conscientiously, making sure none were left.

Feeling the threat was finally over, Sunstreaker relaxed as he watched over the organic marking out the scratches on his exterior carefully and with perfect clarity. Sunny had noted how the other organic had said the fleshing that was with him right now was some sort of expert in paint jobs, and the fact that he was willing to buy the best paint had been a plus factor. But Sunstreaker was highly aware that the organic was not normal.

The Autobot easily saw that the fleshling wasn't the normal civilian type.

If anything, Sunny was aware that it had a knack for spotting details and covering up its surprise very quickly. The proof was there when the fleshling noticed that Sunstreaker's dents were gone but did not tell the other two organics about it. Of course he had healed over the night, but it wasn't normal for the puny thing to see it happen by itself. Plus, having been in a war for a very long time, the Autobot could tell that it was laying low from the others around it. From whom or why Sunny didn't know or care, but simply put…

The organic was _interesting_.

_I think I'll keep an optic on you, fleshy._

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

_Two Days Later at Night…_

Steak.

The wonderful American meal on a grill.

After patching up the best job Skyler had had in his entire life, there was nothing better to eat than steak after a long day’s work. Reed and a couple of other cops had invited him in, and the young man was more than happy to accept the offer. Two plates of steak and he ate like no tomorrow, not really caring if he looked like a person who hadn't eaten in days. He finished off his food very quickly before the others even if they had only one plate. Then someone poked him.

"What?" Skyler snapped clearly not happy that someone had disturbed his enjoyment in the excellence of fine food.

It was Officer Reed, "Kid, there's a sweet lil' lady looking for you."

"Huh?"

Another officer then pointed out, "Over there, in the corner table."

The other cops around them all looked the same way.

The young woman that looked like a model with a mixture of Angelina Jollie and Penelope Cruz seductively used the finger hook as a way of saying 'come here'. _Add in the wink for better affect._

The cops stared disbelievingly. Skyler just smirked.

"If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I'll be on my way," the paint job guy said with just a hint of smugness.

"Go get her tiger!"

"Don't forget to get her number!"

Skyler ignored the cheering and few small insults as he made his way to her. When he got to the table they both smiled at each other in greeting.

"Cathy."

"Sky."

"Has it ever occurred to you to get a job as a model?"

"Have it ever occurred to you to go to Los Angeles and open a custom car shop?"

They both laughed it off like old friends.

"Come on, Sky, take a seat," Catherine giggled excitedly. "I just have to tell you everything for Saturday."

Skyler was rather thankful he had known Catherine for most of his life. It had been a year since he last saw her. She was a sister to him, but that didn't mean that she couldn't use her seductive 'powers' against him. _Gods, she turned into a really hot lady! (Any other guy would have drowned in their own drool on the floor)._ Good thing for him he knew that Cathy was a Con man who was female, so he did have some form of immunity against her. Now those types with seduction power were scary when you got into their den. There was just no way of coming out once you were in.

In a business manner Skyler said, "Tell me everything about it. Don't miss any details."

"Did anyone mention before you're like Uncle Danny, Uncle Rusty and Uncle Nagel combined?" Cathy joked.

She probably was thinking on the lines that a) he had a great mind for ideas and details, b) bad habit of 'chowing' down junk food, and oh yes… c) geek at heart but didn't necessarily look like one.

"A couple of times."

"Good, cuz I want this to be perfect," she said with a pout that would melt any male in front of her like goo.

_She was Aphrodite, Skyler was Hades. Thanks Zeus, for the immunity. _

Skyler was tempted to roll his eyes but thought better of it. He gave a gesture to let her tell her plan, "Let's get started, shall we?"

* * *

Meanwhile back at the garage…

Sunstreaker was contemplating his look in the large mirror of the showroom he was parked in.

_Primus, I haven't looked and felt this great in ages!_

For any person or especially a mech it was spectacular, the paint was first class, the finishing with wax and polish looked stunning, and most of all the small simple but tech-like design of the blending red-orange-back-to-sunny yellow 'streaks' on each side of him made him look very exquisite. _Sunstreaker's conclusion?_ The best and utterly perfect job that he never expected from an organic.

On a general note, Sunny still considered all things organic disgusting.

On a more special note, the fleshling by the name 'Skyler' was deemed to be better than those who were on a general note.

_Get it?_

_No?_

_Tough luck._

Now, if only he could transform into his bi-pedal mode…

He had to get out of the place first.

Sunstreaker scanned around the room to find out that there were security cameras in the main showroom area. It wasn't too difficult for a bot like him as his tech was far more advanced then that of the organic fleshlings.

He still had to follow the fleshling around later on. However there was something on the Autobot's processor that he had in mind that perhaps he wanted to give the fleshling some sort of test. If the puny thing was smart enough, it should be able see through his plans. If it did, then there was a better chance to mark him as the acceptable target he was looking for.

After all, Sunstreaker was the idea person when it came to the pranks he had pulled with Sideswipe and their targets were the Autobots.

Not even Optimus Prime was safe, much less a single fleshling.

* * *

_Few hours later…_

Skyler was feeling irritable after being woken up at an ungodly hour for questioning at the police station.

Some thief had stolen the car that night.

Being con man and thief himself, Skyler was actually curious on how the guy stole the Lambo car, even though he'd just lost his previous masterpiece to the thief before he got to photograph it (a habit he did to remember his work). The police couldn't do much about the theft, the car was undocumented in any type of car store. So the case was cold, and it would be probably closed and dropped in three days as no one was claiming it. Skyler never made it on the suspect list since he was out eating with the cops which happened to be during the time of the crime. Wanting to get answers, he took his laptop in a bag and headed towards the crime scene.

The cops could get the answer in a few months; it takes a thief to realize it in a few minutes, hours, but never as long as a day.

Calmly, he managed to get access to the surveillance room with the help of Officer Reed by saying he was going to look around but he didn't say that maybe there was something left on the surveillance database computer as the tapes looked like they have been hacked with replaced footage. That was for him to find out. With no one to bother him in the surveillance room, he took out his laptop, connected it, and went to work quickly. There was so little time for him to be hanging around at a crime scene.

His brother's special footage replacement detection software started scanning the database, it was positive but then… it stopped.

"Huh?" Skyler typed in a few tasks at the DOS window trying to get to the source of the problem, only to find something really surprising.

He gasped, "The thing is encrypted?" Plus according to his self created program on encryption, it was as high as a government access one. _Perhaps, higher._

And here he thought that Dexter was the one who did it. _This thing was out of the hyperactive thief's league._

More importantly, it was a challenge directed at those who knew.

Skyler cracked his knuckles, "Well, we'll just see how deep this encryption goes."

He typed like mad and got his best encryption programs out as he had another five minutes before he was kicked out. He might not get all of the info, but he was sure going to take a shot at uncovering something.

Unknown to anyone, a couple of blocks away, Sunstreaker was hiding under a car hood. He was covered and just looked like a normal car being covered by the silver anti-water sheet. So, no one had any idea that he was the recently stolen car that had escaped. Sunny monitored the software he had installed in the surveillance system; it was a basic Cybertronian program for encryption, only to find that it was the fleshling Skyler was hacking in. What he found out simply astonished his spark.

The fleshling was no joke at all.

Encryption after encryption went down like dominoes. He was operating at an alarming speed, and though there were many mistakes made in the numerous attempts, it was soon replaced with the right answer leading to the main source of the hidden surprise Sunny had prepared.

Finally, Skyler was on the final level of encryption. He entered in the right answers.

** _Access Accepted. _ **

He blinked at the screen with wide eyes. It was the real footage! He carefully kept his gaze on the monitor that was showing what happening. The car roared to life and started to move on its own… the screen then started to crackle, the garage door opened automatically, and then it was gone through the night. Now, if he was watching a horror film he'd easily wave it off. But this was very real… why else would it be encrypted?

Skyler's head snapped to his laptop as it started to act weird. The laptop bleeped a few times and it was replaced with the same red square face he had seen on the car. Panicking, the young man typed in anything, and everything he could think of to reboot the laptop only to find out he had been locked out of his own laptop.

_CRAP._

He slammed his fist on the table as he realized that he’d gotten hit with a malicious type of overriding software on his laptop.

But before he could do anything else, he heard footsteps coming his way. Quickly as he could, he covered up his hacking in the main computer, and shut down his laptop. When the authorities came in, he simply went out.

Knowing this was way too big to face on his own, he decided that it was better that he didn't push his luck any further. It had already cost him his laptop and probably wasn’t worth the effort.

_X-Files? _

_Definitely. _

And he made sure he was going to keep AWAY from it. He went to the hotel to sleep it off; he didn't care if it was now 10 in the morning. As a bonus, he took a couple sleeping pills. He didn't take chances when it came to nightmares.

On the other side of the road, Sunstreaker couldn't be happier that his time spent on the fleshling was turning out to be worth it. He was still weighing his options about selecting Skyler as a potential target to acquire.

_Maybe with a bit more following around._

The fleshling did sound somewhat happy about the event he was having on Saturday over the communication device and was looking forward to it. Sunstreaker had noticed the smirk on its face and he knew it for what it was.

The smile of a true prankster.

* * *

_Saturday, Central City Park 9:00 am_

Sunstreaker waited patiently hidden in the other side of the street. He kept a tab on the fleshling as it always brought the laptop around with it where ever it went (which he had a tracker program embedded on it in the software). It didn't hide him much but it was a good part of the road where he could see clearly and he was in the VIP section. So basically, normal fleshies couldn't get their dirty hands on him, considering there were other good looking cars around. Wishing he had some high-grade energon with him, he watched Skyler, curious as to what the fleshling had in mind.

According to the plan, Skyler was in the group of tourists looking around just like the others. In front of him, their tourist guide Cathy was showing them around the central park area and leading the way where the mayor would be doing his speech and awarding from the stands. There were plenty of cakes in rows around the podium stand since there was a cooking contest being hosted as well. Looking around the area, he found not too far away Dexter was in the garb of a gardener sweeping away leaves.

The speech was going to start; Dexter just gave a nod to Skyler and a wink to Cathy.

_That was the signal._

Cathy, being the magnet, got closer to Mikey Hills, complementing how the walrus was a cute looking big fluffy teddy bear. Her chipper act, pout with questions, and a bit of cleavage shown to him was more than enough to keep him glued to her. As the crowd noise hushed down in the favor of hearing the Mayor of the town, Skyler walked with meticulous calculation near the two while they were both looking towards the podium, he positioned himself behind them. Now all he had to do was wait for the chaos.

With a smile the Mayor started his speech, "Ladies and Gentleman! Welcome to the 5th…"

'**_BOOM!'_**

A cake exploded in front of the crowd, making many people panic. But it wasn't over… then the other cakes started to explode one after the other.

'**_BOOM!'_**

'**_BOOM!'_**

'**_BOOM!'_**

'**_BOOM!'_**

'**_BOOM!'_**

In the midst of the panic everyone was running all over the place, Cathy screamed in terror, plunged to the walrus in hopes of protection, while she was actually heading for his wallet in his ostentatious office suit. With a swift swipe and another in return, she took the original wallet and replaced it with a fake one. The fake one of course had a thick stack of printed flyers cut out in the size of money. Skyler, ready in position, acted as if he panicked and bumped into her making her crash more into Mikey. Not known to anyone but the two, Cathy slipped the wallet into his hand.

Skyler immediately put it in his own jacket pocket and ran with everyone else out of park.

He looked back to see that Dexter was already absent. Skyler had to admit the harmless explosives orchestrated by Dexter with a remote control were impressive, a mixture of light bombs and loud sound resonators. Calmly, he walked out of the crime scene with a smile on his face. _Mission__ accomplished._

Unknowingly, he walked right by the same Lamborghini he’d painted only days before which was four cars away due to his happiness in the success of the short con. Sunstreaker did a brief scan on him. The fleshling's heart beat was slightly elevated meaning it was happy and then, he noticed that Skyler had stolen something. From the scan's results… a _very_ thick wallet. Sunny had seen the whole stealing action very clearly. The Autobot could only chuckle with barely suppressed glee.

_Undeniably, a prankster and thief. _

So that was why the fleshy was keeping a low profile.

Optics focusing on the potential being marked as acceptable, Sunstreaker started making plans.

_Looks like you're the winner, fleshy._

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 1.02: Target Confirmed_

_Planet Earth, some fleshling town._

_It seems like I finally found the right fleshing to get. _

_He's no pushover either. I didn't think the little puny thing was worth it at first. Good paint job, he hacked into the security system (plus he got through a basic Cybertronian encryption) without ever breaking a sweat or getting caught, and watching him pull a heist on a fat squishy very calmly like that…not your ordinary person to meddle with and not entirely truthful to law enforcement. _

_Perfect._

_After tuning in a few times from simple cell phone signals at a close distance, and other information I could get, the fleshy was leaving town to some place that the other fleshies called 'Kansas City'. Luckily for me, there wasn't a flight or train available at the requested time the fleshy wanted to go. So it was going to take the night bus. Since it was in the night and the place is a bit secluded… that's when I'll grab him with me. _

_I'm not really looking forward to having the fleshling in my interior for long periods of time while on the road._

_Big boss would probably throw me in the brig for this, and Ratchet the Hatchet…well; I don't want to think about it just yet._

_It wasn't like I was going to meet them tomorrow. _

_If Sides were here…I'd probably never hear the end of it. _

_ME getting a pet fleshy…_

_Can you IMAGINE it? _

_~ Sunny_

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

** _TBC...  _ **


	3. Car-napped by an Alien, Fleshy Pet Problems

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual...
> 
> Enjoy the Ride!

* * *

**~ Chapter 3: Car-napped by an Alien, Fleshy Pet Problems~**

**   
**

* * *

**  
**

_Con man Log Entry 1.03: Unanticipated Trouble_

_Town outside of New Orleans, Louisiana, US._

_At the end of the day, I met up Cathy and Dexter at the hotel. To our utter surprise and glory, it looks like Mikey was much greedier than we thought. He had $12.000 in that wallet of his! So it was 4 grand each after being split three ways, best reward we had in a while with lady luck on our side. As for the wallet, we auctioned it off on EBay. Never expected it to get about five hundred for it, must have been a new state- of-the-art wallet. The money was later on donated to charity, the best place to cover up our tracks. _

_The day after our heist, we all parted ways. Dexter set out for Vegas, Cathy went on her way to Washington, and my departure was in two days. It was the basic rule to any con, to never hang around at the scene of your crime. I was going to miss them, it had been fun to team up with them on a real con, not like the usual pranks we did as kids. They both told me if I got into any trouble or needed help, all I had to do was call. _

_Now, trouble for any Con man usually came from the authorities, rivals, people who wanted revenge on you because you conned on them, and people who wanted you dead because you are a Con man. Pretty dangerous, right?_

_I was in trouble. The worst part was, it was none that I had mentioned above._

_I knew for the last few days that I was being followed. Even before we did the short con, but mostly I was convinced afterward. Call it an instinct, but it's easy to be sure if you got a hand mirror. Alarmingly, I was being followed by a possessed car. You heard me. A POSSESSED car. No driver, it moved on its own, and it was the VERY same Lambo I pimped at the garage. Only now, it had an ID number that belonged to no one. I checked. And…Don't get me started that it was an A.I. car. I had buddies in colleges, institutions, the gray market, the black market, and there's nothing like what I saw in the Lambo. _

_Who was I going to call for help? Ghostbusters? Or I could do the Dean and Sam thing from Supernatural, load some rock salt into a shotgun, shoot it, and pray it works while running. Then again… maybe not. _

_Seriously, I have enough problems as it is. No way was I going to engage that thing. The faster I get out of this town, the better._

_I hope it doesn't get any worse._

_Shit. Murphy's Law._

_I shouldn't have written that._

_~ Sky _

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

Skyler replaced the curtains after inspecting the street from his hotel for what he figured was the 111th time that night.

He couldn't sleep, out of sleeping pills, and basically paranoid because he was certain that sunny yellow Lambo was out there somewhere. Well, who wouldn't be agitated if they knew were being followed? By humans, the paint job guy would understand and be a little bit calmer. But a car that moved by itself? Any normal person would freak. He wasn't a normal person and _he_ was freaking out.

_Come on, Sky. Just another eighteen hours or so. _

His departure was due at 7 pm tomorrow at night. Skyler was starting to regret that he’d been a bit laid back when he ordered the bus ticket.

His gaze then shifted elsewhere. Skyler glanced helplessly at his now useless laptop. The bloody thing wasn't working at all. It was dead. He silently cursed himself that he didn't have a major backup to all the programs that he’d installed in it. Since most of them were made by him and Steve, he hadn't backed them up after he sold his CPU. Too much was on his mind to make backup plans by taking the laptop apart in a place where he had the right tools and resources, but that had to wait for later. His main focus was to get away from the town ASAP.

Restlessly, he laid down on his bed again, thinking over the options of getting an earlier bus ticket. _Like tonight._

_Would that really make a difference? _

Skyler for once in his life wasn't sure of anything that night. There was a saying that patience was a virtue, and there was another saying that said delaying things was dangerous. Which to follow? Sighing, he erased his thoughts and went back to the main principles of being a con man. If one was in trouble, they would immediately get out of it. No questions, no complaints, no nothing. The only thing to do was to GET OUT.

_Than get CAUGHT._

With a new resolve, Skyler jumped out of his bed, got everything he needed and owned in the room (minus his clothes), and stuffed it in his bag. As for clothes, he went to a local hypermarket down the road, got himself a jacket with a hood, gloves, and new clothes for traveling. He threw his old ones in the trash bin out on the streets. The Skyler that the town had known was no more.

Next, he checked out of the hotel, took a taxi, and told the driver to get to any travel bus agent that had midnight schedule taking him out of town, even if it wasn't straight to Kansas City. He still had a good deal of cash on him after the short con; he wasn't going to worry about expenses at least. Skyler knew this was probably the least planned thing he had done in a long time. He never liked it when a certain situation came up and the details were sketchy. He was used to knowing things in advance and almost always had plans for them. But perhaps if he did the unexpected for the possessed car, he could get away from it.

Praying to every god or great deity out there, Skyler hoped he could get away.

He prayed especially to Hermes, the messenger Greek God that was the patron and protector of liars and thieves...

* * *

"You're sure about this?" Epps asked the fifth time that day.

"Positive."

"We're not really butting into their personal territory are we?"

Will paused. "It is personal, the reason why he's been behaving oddly."

"And we ask their medic?" the other said hesitantly.

"Ironhide said so, and it's where we'll find the best answer. Since… he didn't want to answer it himself."

"Hope we get some answers. This case can get worse."

"So do I man, so do I."

Major William Lennox sighed. Months after the events in Egypt things in N.E.S.T had been like the stock exchange. There were many things the Major listed things off, many were good things, others were not so good things. Many good things had come in with Jazz coming back to life with the help of the Matrix of Leadership thanks to Sam Witwicky and the arrival of new Autobots coming in the last few months.

Their new addition of the Autobots consisted of Optimus' now second-in-command Prowl, another medic by the name of Red Alert, Ironhide's sparkmate Chromia, her sister Flareup, a rather odd scientist bot that had a tendency to blow up his inventions called Wheeljack, and finally Bluestreak, a bot that astounded many of the humans at the base that many were wondering how on earth the bot could keep on talking for disturbing long periods of time without stopping. Two more Autobots by the designation of Mirage and Hound were on their way in two days, and the news couldn't have been better. It was great to see the family of bots growing with bonds that the humans formed with them and there was a better chance in fighting the war against the Decepticons.

The not so good things came with the countless paper work that both William and Robert had to tackle through the day from the higher ups. As if fieldwork wasn't enough, there were times when they had to be dragged into the political side of things. They were thankful that General Morshower had done his best to keep many of the power hungry politicians away. Yet there was always a weed that was difficult to get rid of and kept constantly growing back.

Especially, when it came to a certain person who was Liaison to the Autobots, Director Theodore Galloway.

Well formally he was a director of sorts and a politician, but what made Lennox and Epps hate the man with a fiery passion was the fact he was the worst liaison in existence. And that was a fact that even the Autobots shared with everyone else in N.E.S.T. The man still had not forgiven Will after the incident where he _fortunately_ but _not intentionally_ had been tossed out of the plane because he pulled the parachute out of sheer panic. Will was lucky enough that after the incident that N.E.S.T. was back from its disbanded state and he was still on the job.

The fact that the man was part of the government that was intent on gaining the technology of a highly advanced race had not made things any easier. Galloway had cut budget after budget in trying to get the Transformers to comply, but Optimus Prime endured. Not satisfied that he couldn't get his way through the leader, the liaison had ideas that he could at least get his way from the other Autobots after failing miserably in going after their human supporters. Ironhide, Ratchet, Bumblebee, the twin scouts, and a few other bots were not interfered with because of their close human companions or they were not supposedly in his view worthy to pursue as a possibly easy target.

What Will and Epps never imagined was that Galloway targeted the most unlikely bot they could think of.

Sideswipe.

_For the love of God, what was the man THINKING?_

Consequences?

One left arm with broken bones in seven places. _Ouch. _

_Damn lucky too. Many had expected the mech to cut the human in half with his infamous blades. _

The Army Major was glad Galloway didn't end up dead in the first place, although he secretly wanted to make Galloway learn his lesson about messing with gigantic mechs.

Will was surprised at the mech's sudden outburst at the time for he did not understand what had put Sideswipe in a rather violent mood. The Autobots could get angry at times, but it was under Optimus' order that they were not to hurt humans. Thanks to the so-called politician being the 'tattle' tale that he was, Sideswipe was prosecuted on attacking a government official, Will had another pile of paperwork to handle, and Optimus Prime, plus Sam had to do some negotiations with the higher ups about Galloway's actions in deliberately instigating a fight.

Sergeant Robert Epps however had seen signs on how odd Sides was behaving in the last few months, considering he was the one that took responsibility for the bot although Sideswipe was not officially Epps' guardian. In training sessions Epps didn't have any problems with the mech, but during normal/off shifts Epps had noticed that since the new arrival of Autobots his mood was going downhill in a hurry. Clearly there was a disappointment in the bot, as if he was waiting for someone that was never going to come. Sideswipe began to speak less and became withdrawn, the fact that Bumblebee and the twins Mud Flap and Skids were now off the base guarding Sam and Leo was also affecting him.

Pretty much left in the dark as no bot was explaining anything, so they both agreed to take action and asked. Will had consistently asked Ironhide, but the large trigger happy weapons specialist seemed to be rather uneasy about explaining the cause so he only mentioned about asking their CMO, Ratchet, with circumstances they would do so during Sideswipe's patrol.

They headed to the building which housed the Med Bay.

* * *

Unluckily for Skyler, the so-called Greek god Athena, patron of wisdom, strength, strategy, craft, justice and skill was on the side of Sunstreaker.

Noticing that the beacon target was moving in his radar, the elder twin Autobot followed the marker with mounting excitement. The squishy was just full of surprises, and Sunny was now convinced it had unpredictable tendencies that kept him interested and away from the thoughts of other organic things on this planet. Sunstreaker by all counts was sure that the fleshling's real departure time was due in another 18 hours. Yet, since the signal was moving on route to a transportation area and Sunny was sure Skyler had not realized his deactivated laptop was implanted with a tracking tag.

Sunstreaker casually made his way around the streets, maneuvering expertly along a different route towards his confirmed target.

The fleshy was very cautious in that even during the times the warrior followed him, he would scuttle quickly off in another direction after he spotted Sunny from the hidden hand mirror he always held in his hand. He couldn't have gotten any better target than this and there was no other chance to get hold onto it once it left the town. It would be too conspicuous if his alt-form followed the bus all the way to where ever the fleshling was going… and Sunstreaker wasn't going to let go of his recently finished paint job so soon.

_Try as you might fleshy, you can run all you like, but you cannot hide. _

For one that lived for many eons, Sunstreaker had all the experience that no human could ever have fathomed in any if not all types of pranks planed to absolute perfection that occasionally had to deal with extremely difficult targets such as a certain weapons specialist and the CMO of the Autobots. He had made side plans in expecting that the organic might panic and try to get away before the real time of exodus. While the squishy was busy in preparation of getting ready for the show in the city central park, Sunny had made his own preparations in every single bus terminal that were the out-of-town exit points.

Although Sunstreaker was disgusted that he was going to have an organic in him very soon, perhaps it was better to speed up a few things.

_I'll enjoy the chase while it lasts. _

It wasn't like things were going to get easier after he nabbed the fleshing to get to Nevada. There was still that injured Decepticon around the area that he’d fought off when he originally landed outside the town to worry about. He had to keep the little organic alive if he ever were to engage the fraggin' glitched coward, if not he'd have to find another one with a less likely chance of getting a good one.

With haste, Sunny accelerated easily outmatching Skyler's taxi to the intended destination.

And there, he waited for his prey.

* * *

"So he's suffering with the absence of his twin?"

"Yes, Major Lennox," Optimus Prime replied. "It is without a doubt that his reactions and moods are affected in the absence of Sunstreaker."

"And every Autobot coming in who isn't Sunstreaker is making him give up hope," Epps sighed. "That's painful."

Lennox was now scratching his head at the immense explanation he just heard. Apparently Cybertronian twins had a sparks that were connected to each other, that was a vital part of a bond that was strong in a sense of emotions and even in a physical sense. All this time, Will never had taken to the fact that something like this was considered a serious thing by the Cybertronians. _Who would be when your example of twins were Mud Flap and Skids? _But he soon realized that all this time in working with the Autobots, by all counts Optimus never had separated the younger twins on any mission. Where Mud Flap was, Skids was there as well, no matter how much they fought with each other over words or punches in each others faces.

"If it is not a problem, sir, I suggest that Sideswipe take leave of his duties until appointed at the right time," Ratchet advised.

Sergeant Epps winced, "Are you sure? He's not gonna like that. Sides is a proud warrior, taking him off of duties is like declaring he's not useful anymore."

"His rather violent mood will rise," Ratchet pressed. "His discipline is great in training, but how long will it last?"

Optimus considered the situation briefly, but he would always wish to hear any more proposals in taking a middle decision that benefited all sides. "Do you have any other ideas, Will?"

Will shifted uncomfortably weighing his choices. "Perhaps we could still have him on duty, but call it a vacation away from the base."

"How do you intend to do that?" Epps asked.

"Well," Lennox sighed. "You both explained before that Sideswipe is more comfortable with the younger Autobots, he could stay with Bumblebee and the twins on guardian duty as a lookout. That way he can take leave away from the base; it still keeps him _on_ duty and with Mirage and Hound coming soon, his post on base is filled in."

"Good idea," Epps concurred. "What do you think, Ratchet?"

"Considering we will be on the mainland when Mirage and Hound land on Earth, it is a good idea. As long as I can give him a good check-up once in a while I think the idea is acceptable," the medic reasoned. "Optimus?"

Sealing everyone's decision Optimus took the order, "Very well. We shall prepare everything to be accounted for."

* * *

_Tick… tick… tick…_

_Tick… tick… tick…_

_Tick… tick… tick…_

During what seemed to be the longest wait in his entire life, Skyler looked at the clock with an aggravating feeling. It felt like he’d be waiting an eternity for the bus would show up. The fact that the whole area was isolated with hardly any humans around had raised the tension like it was in a horror movie. The young man moved uncomfortably trying to calm himself down in what seemed to be the waiting area. But every now and then his thoughts would end up at the possessed Lamborghini.

_That's it; I am sooo not watching any horror movies or series after this. _

While it was spring, it was chilly that night. He looked at his hands to see they were starting to freeze, courtesy to his bad habit of have excess sweat coming from his hands when he was nervous or something that excited him. Deciding to warm them up, Skyler went to a warm drink vending machine across the road. He chose a canned drink of milk tea, contemplating the fact that it was probably for the best, since he could sleep off every crazy thing he'd been thinking of once he got into the midnight bus.

Half an hour later, Skyler was starting to realize that something was horribly wrong. He checked the time to find it was already 25 minutes past the time the bus should be at the terminal. So why wasn't the bus coming? And then a sudden grasp struck him.

** _-Flashback-_ **

_Skyler checked up on the available travel times for the out of town bus. _

_He opened up the site to find the monitor fuzzed up a bit. The young con man simply asked the admin who was beside him. "Are your monitors okay? You seem to have some sort of interference or something."_

"_What are you talking about?" the admin snapped. "We just got these state-of-the-art CPUs last week!" _

_As a sign of peace, Skyler backed off. "Fine, just saying…" _

** _-Another Flashback-_ **

"_Bus terminal at this hour?" the Taxi driver asked shrewdly in confusion._

_Skyler blinked. "Yeah, it's alright with you?"_

"… _Well. Ok, man. Your business. I just got to get you there right? I'm on it," the other shrugged. _

** _-End of Flashback-_ **

He had been hacked! There was never a midnight bus in the first place!

He was so focused on realizing everything that he didn't notice the place where he stopped on the dust road; a certain Lamborghini car was right in front of him. Its headlights when on full to alert the human of its worst nightmare.

Snapping the daylights out of him, Skyler gulped as looked to the source of the lights to find it was the car.

_He looked…_

_He screamed…_

_He ran…_

Sunstreaker certainly was enjoying chasing down the fleshling. He swished from side to side, sometimes he sped up just barely touching the human but enough to make the human know he was going to crash into him, and he made sure he got the human going where he wanted it to. Eventually they soon made it to their destination, an abandoned storage facility.

Out of breath, Skyler clumsily tripped over and expected the worst, to be run over.

But it never came.

Perplexed he looked over his shoulder and turned around to see the car was still active but had stopped in its place.

Gears shifted and turned, metal plating transforming into what it looked a 15 ft gigantic robot on wheels with twin blades and small cannon rifles just behind its shoulders. Its blue eyed optics stared hard at Skyler as it was looking at him and scanning him with interest.

Taking in the size, Skyler's reflex on flight had jumped back into gear with the adrenaline and made a run for it.

Sunstreaker sighed. He wasn't in the mood for introductions either.

The warrior bot simply skated off on his wheels chasing the terrified organic, gave a small nudge on the back of its neck, and it fainted.

"Troublesome noisy fleshy," Sunstreaker grumbled as he carefully tucked the unconscious human in one hand and picked up its bag. He carefully transformed so that he at the end had managed to put the organic inside him. _This is just so disgusting._ He put the seatbelt on it tying it up and closed his door. Next he drove away quietly while obeying the speed limits until he was out of the town.

_At least the capturing is over; it was only a matter of time before the thing was going to wake up. _

Another thing Sunstreaker wasn't looking forward to.

* * *

Dazedly, the brown haired dude woke up seeing the car clock indicating it was ten pm or something…

_Car clock? _

_Wait…_

_Wasn't he on a bus?_

Impulsively, Skyler looked around to find he was in the car! _The _POSSESSED robot car!

Just as he was going to get into a fit, his seatbelt tightened around him tying him down to the front seat.

"Don't move so much organic!" a voice boomed over the radios.

Skyler immediately stiffened, the fact that the steering wheel was moving on its own wasn't comforting either. _Did it say organic?_

Taking easy and steady breaths, he clamed himself down. Although his heart beat was anything but calm.

_Silence. _

Knowing it could talk in English, maybe he should communicate with it. Skyler then nervously asked, "S-So… W-what are you anyway?"

The answer was brief, "An Autonomous Robotic Organism from Cybertron."

Skyler blinked. _That certainly was a mouthful._

"Why are you abducting me?" another question as his courage was starting to come back.

No answer.

The young con man even though he was still scared out of his wits, pondered what this alien was going to do with him. Think as he might, it seemed the alien was resistant to silent treatment. Or maybe it preferred Skyler not talking at all.

It wasn't until another half an hour later when Skyler broke the silence to ask a question, "Can you let me out in a while? It's a bit stiff in here."

Sunstreaker felt appalled replying to someone inside him. "And why should I let you out?"

"Well, you know, I might need to vomit." The paint job guy said without thinking.

The car halted so fast he crashed his head on the dash board.

_Then Skyler plus his bag were unceremoniously ejected out of the door._

"What did you do that for?" Skyler shouted and snapped angrily nursing his sore head and soon he was feeling the pain in his back. _Son of a b****, that f****** hurt._

"You WILL NOT vomit in me fleshling!"

"Ugh…" Skyler sat up still cursing about back pains. "Alright, alright. Yeesh. If you get me to a gas station once in a while then I won't. I got my needs you know."

"As long as you leave your _disgusting_ organic matters to yourself," Sunny grumbled, as he again opened the door. "Get back in before I decide to squish you!"

Skyler got off the ground, dusted himself off, picked up his bag, and went into the car. _Who knew that aliens have hygiene problems?_

Later, at a gas station….

The young paint job con man ate his 'brunch' (breakfast 'n' lunch) at the cafeteria as he disdainfully looked out the window to see that the Lambo was watching him intently like vulture at a meal. It had managed to get a good deal of attention as many people were looking at it with very greedy, if not happy faces. It wasn't often that they would find one hanging around in areas like this and it was too good to be true to find one away from the main cities in America.

What did this robotic organism want from him anyway? Seriously, it was giving him a silent treatment all the way that Skyler did not think he could connect to it in any way. If anything, he just wanted to get away from it now knowing it had all the blades, cannons, and weapons that could easily kill him. Heck, all it needed to do was step on him and he was finished. He needed to get to Kansas City, not play hostage with some E.T. who gods knew what it wanted. Maybe an exit strategy was in order. Hmm…

Then something caught Skyler's attention…

_That's an idea._

A few minutes after…

Sunstreaker briefly went into a recharge thinking that the fleshling was going to take a while to do the 'organic' business or whatever they did. He was somewhat annoyed with these other fleshbags who were around him and getting their pictures in front of him with cameras. He felt like rolling his optics. Of course if a fleshy tried to touch him he simply gave a static shock to them. He did NOT want to be touched by them, thank you very much.

Noticing the high security on the car, most of the people did back off a bit, but some still stubbornly took pictures. In another few minutes, Sunstreaker was getting restless. He scanned his tracker through out the gas station to find his taken fleshling.

_To find out nothing._

A pause.

He scanned the whole gas station again…

To find the Skyler was no where in his radar but outside of it.

The reaction was instantaneous.

_SLAG IT, FLESHY! I'M SO FRAGGING YOU TO THE PIT THAT YOU WILL WISH YOU WERE NEVER CREATED_!

* * *

_Meanwhile just a couple of miles away and an hour later…_

"Aaaachoo! Hachoo! Hachoo!"

The con man wiped his nose. That couldn't be good, maybe a certain alien must have realized what was going on and was cursing his name.

Skyler walked on the long main road looking around for any cars.

He was now wearing a black leather jacket, blue jeans, a white shirt and black boots plus a black baseball cap, courtesy of bribing a random guy his age that had his size of clothes with two hundred dollars for the clothes switch. He still had his bag, but it was an affective disguise or what con men call the 'lookie-loo'. He managed to fool the bot by pretending to be someone else as he waltzed over to the other side of the station to hitch a ride on a farmer's truck without getting seen. It didn't take him really far, but far enough to be away from the alien robot.

Of course Skyler was actually having second thoughts of pulling a Houdini on the alien. Was it really wise to pull off something like that on gigantic robot that could easily squish you on the spot? _Very unwise. Stupid even._ He considered the fact that he was wanted alive, so the survival rate was high…but torture and the other stuff that aliens could do? Well, he was pretty screwed up on that one, if he got caught, and apparently that could happen as after passing by so many cars or trucks he hadn't gotten a hitch to ride.

It wasn't until another few minutes to half an hour before to his utter disappointment and he was facing it again.

_The LP 570-4 Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera he pimped out just a few days ago. _

Anyone would be _thrilled_ to hitch a ride in one of course, unless… if it _wasn't_ a robot alien that wanted to abduct you.

_Surprise, surprise. _

It was slowly crawling behind him now, but there were large dangerous growls and the rev of the engine was enough to make Skyler shudder in fear. Even if it was still in its car form it was scary. But he stubbornly walked on and ignored it.

Sunstreaker was furious. If only Optimus didn't have those stupid rules of not hurting humans, he would have just squished the little fragger and got another fleshling.

Sunny grumbled, "You _will _come with ME."

"No," the young man said clearly without glancing behind his back.

"Come back here, _fleshy_." It was a command.

"Says the robot that got _tricked_ by the fleshy," Skyler bravely taunted as he rolled his eyes. He simply walked away.

Another revving growl was heard. But it soon turned into a mocking snide remark, "But you couldn't possibly search for whatever you're looking for or going on without the deactivated data, can you, organic?"

Skyler stopped dead on his tracks.

The laptop!

_Shit. Why did it have to be super intelligent alien robot and not the tooth fairy? _

_It just had to hit the jackpot. Damn it!_

Sunstreaker silently celebrated his victory upon the human. _Take that fleshy!_

"So you're the one who locked my laptop?" Skyler asked accusingly.

_That_ _pretty much explained the false footage and the malicious overriding software. _

"Isn't that obvious organic?" the sarcasm coming from Sunstreaker's voice. "There's no getting that data back unless I unlock it."

The young man growled. _Bastard!_

The spiky dark brown-haired man sighed in frustration. His con man instincts were telling him that he really didn't have any choice in the matter if he was going to find his brother. Every delay was another setback in finding his brother. But what did this alien want from him? He was a thief and only a paint job guy for crying out loud! Skyler didn't have any relations to anything like Area 51 or Roswell or any other alien-obsessed organization. Muttering incoherent words and thinking the only way to get through this in one piece and not end up in an asylum for lunatics, he went back to the basic method of everything. _Asking._

"Fine," he gave a sign of peace as he raised his hand up. In a manner of confusion even if he was pissed off, he held his temper in check. "What is that you want from me?"

"Show me the way to the military base of Nevada." the mech said irritably. "I can't get there with my navigation and communication systems offlined."

_What was he? A tour guide? That was a couple of states away! _

Digesting the information silently, Skyler still wasn't sure about doing it. He had other problems to deal with. "Why are you headed there?"

"Classified," the tone was stiff and there wasn't going to be any clues either.

That wasn't really helping things, but Skyler now knew that the alien was smart enough to know the tools of trade. Anything personal was always considered classified. The problem was, was this alien going to attack the military base in some take over the world plot or something? Stupid question, but probable with the weapons it had at its disposal. Still, he was a thief. Let the government deal with whatever they were going to face. It wasn't his business to get into some intergalactic fighting mess.

"What's in it for me?" Skyler sternly said making sure the alien knew he was serious. "A trade for a trade. I get something what I want, you get what you want."

Sunstreaker snorted. _Finally the fleshling was starting to think right for once_.

"I can get you to Kansas City faster than any transport you organics have. I am the epitome of the fastest of my kind on land. Finish whatever you want to do there, and you show me the way to Nevada."

The information that he was heading for Kansas City wasn't new to the alien which meant he indeed had been on Skyler's back like a hawk in the last few days. Possibly tagged him as a target too (although he wasn't sure how). But Skyler's ears perked up when he heard the part 'of my kind', which stated clearly there were more of them here. Of course, the con man side of him poked and prodded his head telling him to stay away from what was not his business, and focus on what made it his business. He shook his head to clear it. There just wasn't a luxury of time to make the logical decision with detailed facts.

_What was the most important thing now? _

_Steve._

A pang was there in his heart, and this time he followed his emotions. Very dangerous and highly illegal for a con man, but it was the only thing he had left that he was really fighting for. On the contrary, perhaps heading to Nevada wasn't a bad idea at least. He could visit Uncle Reuben in Vegas and disappear from there.

The young man glanced at the car in front of him and said, "I want my laptop back to the way it was. You get me to Kansas City, I finish my things there, and I'm your personal guide to Nevada. Deal?"

There was a pause before the voice went out of radio, "Sealed."

Skyler nodded. "Good."

And with that, Sunstreaker opened his door, "Get in."

* * *

Another three more hours of silence…

It wasn't like the both of them had a conversation to strike up. Sunstreaker was happy he didn't pick up a fleshy femme as they had a tendency to yap a lot, silence was enough for him to get on with his job of getting the fleshy to Kansas City quickly and efficiently. As for Skyler it was perfectly fine as he had much to think about, as far as who he was going to get in touch with later on to find his brother.

And what the alien robot had said was true, he was fast.

_Heh,_ _understatement of the millennium._

_UBER CRAZY FAST._

It felt like riding a non-stop jet powered roller coaster.

Skyler was a bit thankful he didn't have a heavy lunch, and dinner? Well, he'd have to miss it anyway… he didn't want to throw up in the car and get squished by the alien.

Looking at the night scenery which was a blur, they were probably out in the middle of nowhere, but still heading north towards Kansas City. If they kept going like this, they would be there in less than two days. Skyler wasn't going to complain about speed limits though, from what he figured every time the bot would move much slower was when the alien knew there were cops around. Once out of sight, then he just zoomed off without any worry.

His thoughts were disturbed when Sunstreaker made a sudden swerve off the road into the open and stopped behind a large rock formation.

"Huh?"

"WOAH!"

_Again Skyler plus his bag were unceremoniously ejected out of the door. _

This time around, he was able to roll over and didn't cause more pain to his back.

_Crack._

Ok, it wasn't perfect. At least it wasn't a fall flat out on his back like last time.

Groaning in a bit of a pain, he got to his bearings on the ground and shifted himself up to see that the robot was in its true form. Skyler was about to complain, until there was a large screeching noise that continued with the sound of stimulating air vents, sonorous booms, and a sudden local earthquake. Being the smaller one, Skyler by reflex curled up into a ball and closed his ears in pain.

_What the hell was going on?_

Now the screech was gone, but the sounds of the booms and clicks had not.

As the young con man struggled to stand up, he soon saw the robot on the sprawled on ground and looked like he was clutching a part of him. _Its heart?_

Constrained to his spot in fear and concern, he couldn't do anything out of shock. Skyler then focused on the sounds of painful howls.

The first words or what seemed to be rather static were no language that Skyler heard of until…

"#$%$#$#$%…Sides… Sideswipe…ugh…" the robot alien groaned in pain.

By the looks of every part of the robot's body he was shutting down.

"Sideswipe?" Skyler blinked in confusion.

_Just who was that? _

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 1.03: Difficult pet and Lock-downs_

_Planet Earth, On the roads, middle of nowhere._

_I can't believe the fleshy had managed to fool out of me of all bots that I actually lost him for a moment! That was EMBARRASSING! _

_For some reason, I had somewhat regretted in selecting him as a target. Even if I did have a leash on him, he was dangerous. Especially when he had too much time to think. At least in the end we struck a trade for what we both wanted without getting into personal reasons. There was still hostility between us, but I'm not surprised and it doesn't matter. And there was still that 'Con on the loose. Pit, what have I gotten myself into? Every single thing was glitchin' one after the other. _

_The worst just had to happen during the night. _

_It was clear that Sides was calling out for me, he was in the same pain I was having because we couldn't connect. But I couldn't let the bond open, not a fragging chance. Now that Sides had somehow to managed to force himself through, if I wasn't careful Soundwave's thing could cause my brother's spark to enter a stasis lock. I couldn't care less about the damage it was doing to my own spark. As long as it didn't hurt him, it was better that way. Even if it meant that my body would end up in a lock-down. _

_As I crumbled down and my optics shutdown to the spasms of pain in my spark, I realized the organic was somehow welded to the spot, he wasn't moving or anything. _

_He didn't run away from me._

_He just… stood there. _

_In sympathy?_

_But why?_

_After all I did to abduct him… he was still a full of questions. _

_~ Sunny._

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

**TBC…**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cliffhanger…
> 
> So, it's a rough start for the two stubborn guys (both egoistic, a young con man + thief and warrior mech). As you can see, they have no respect for each other that even introductions can't make it in their mouths. Yup, no mentioning of name either … how will they fare against each other in the next chap?
> 
> Hmm… who knows? *grins evily*


	4. Amends to an Autobot, A Human Connection

* * *

**~ Chapter 4: Amends to an Autobot, A Human Connection ~**

**   
**

* * *

**  
**

_Con man Log Entry 1.04: Damage Control_

_Unknown location, On the way to Kansas City, US._

_I could have run that night. _

_But I didn't. _

_I could not. _

_It was my dad's words that kept me there. A distant memory I remembered. It was one of his regrets in life I suppose and the reason why my family members are mostly Con men. You see, my family hadn't always been this way. My grandfather for one was a good man, worked hard, earnestly, honestly, and even helped others who were in need. He paid the bills on time, had served in the military for the war, he was everything my father and my uncles would have wanted for their father figure. But before he could truly enjoy his retirement, he was taken down by a greedy businessman that had support from a corrupt local governor. My father never told me how that person killed my grandfather, but it was clear that my family was stripped down penniless and chose to become Con Men. _

_When we were young, dad always said,_

"_When a person dies, never leave them dying alone. If you're the only one around, be sure to at least hear their dying wish. And if you can, fulfill it."_

_Not really understanding anything because we were young, Steve, Scarlet and I asked why. There was only a sad reply._

"_Because we never knew what your grandfather had wanted. He died alone, with no one to ever hear him, and let him rest in peace."_

_The memory made me think a lot and it was the reason why I stayed with the alien robot that night. I was somewhat afraid that I would have broken my father's memories if I didn't. I went over to the robotic alien to check if it was alive. While I was searching for a heartbeat, I heard a humming sound. When I peered into its chest at what seemed to be its heart, I discovered it was a glowing ball of some kind of fire. _

_It was a relief it was alive, even if it did abduct me. What caught my attention the most was that it was calling out to someone called 'Sideswipe'. It was such an odd name. Perhaps it was something equivalent to English from the alien's language. But if anything, the way it called was something universal. It was a call for a family member. I don't know how I knew this, I just _knew_. _

_I suppose it did make sense in a way why it desperately abducted me out of the blue. I couldn't really imagine being alone on a different planet not knowing anything. _

_Perhaps some relations 'fixing' was in order._

_~ Sky_

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

Night Camping.

In the middle of nowhere.

With an unconscious alien robot.

Awesome. _Note the sarcasm._

Not the worst or the best thing to do in life, but Skyler seemed to have accepted the fact that his life was either getting more interesting or it was going to be a major letdown. Being the positive guy that he was, he chose that perhaps he'd make the most out of it. _For better or worse._

Out of sheer boredom and as well due to the lack of light, Skyler had lit up a camp fire just a few meters in front of the unconscious body of the alien robot. He knew for sure that the little fire wasn't going to help the bot at all, but Skyler felt more inclined to keep himself busy keeping the fire burning with what little wood he got from the trees nearby. Even if they were not exactly too far from the road, but they were out of sight of most vehicles due to the rock formation, and the young con man wasn't in the mood to move anywhere. He was already getting comfortable where he was.

While his laptop was for certain unusable, Skyler had always had a mini notebook that housed his entire links around the country. Numerous telephone numbers, cell phone numbers, private numbers, addresses, emails, sites, and even addresses with each their own specialties were all there. Inside it was a folded map of the US and his numerous fake IDs. With nothing to do, the dark brown haired youth searched for a tool he was looking for in his bag.

He took out a mobile GPS and put it on; making sure it was on scan mode to lock on the nearest 11 satellites to mark his bearings and put it down. Next he unfolded out the map to find the State of Louisiana on the map and the location of Kansas City. In times like this, a real mobile GPS was far more useful than the ones inserted into cell phone; at least the accuracy wasn't off by more than 5 meters. Beeping, the GPS then showed its coordinates to show where Skyler was. The young man then made a comparison.

Skyler couldn't help but rub his eyes twice to look at the coordinates and what the map showed.

They were already near the Tennessee State border! Perhaps a couple of more miles, then they would be entering the city outskirts of Memphis.

Of course, Skyler did some calculations in his head. The gas station they stopped at and where the alien picked him up at the farm was still just outside town… but whole trip would have taken about more than five hours… But the whole trip would have taken more than five hours… The alien had managed to have traveled it in _three _hours before he fainted. Estimating the robot's insane speed and expert maneuvering through traffic, Skyler estimated they probably would get into the city in half an hour.

He wasn't kidding when he stated he was one of the fastest._ Scary. _

Silently, Skyler cursed himself for not really paying attention to the roads. But then he dismissed it, since everything was pretty much in a blur and they must have zoomed through a couple of towns without him feeling it. He only mentioned which interstate roads were to be taken to get there, and here he was.

Maybe now was a really good time to get all contacts that he could use when he got to Memphis. Perhaps someone with shelter, food, and a large secluded place would be good. Another person with links to the bank, and also he needed to see a weapons specialist if possible. He probably needed a gun once he was in the city, as it was also considered part of the top crime cities in the US.

But most important of all, _Intel_…and LOTS of it before he went to Kansas City in the least time possible.

_Better safe than sorry. _

Skyler glanced at the alien robot, who was still not moving. _Looks like we'll be here a little longer._ He found the numbers he was looking for in the mini notebook, flipped open his cell phone, and started to make a call.

_If we're lucky, Uncle Basher's brother, Uncle Franz is in the city with Uncle Neil (his accomplice). _

The young con man hit the call button and it was picked up by the person.

"Hello? Sorry to bother you at night, is this Uncle Franz?" Skyler asked, he paused a moment to hear a 'yes' on the line. "This is Sky, I'm actually on my way to Memphis and-"

Expecting the large reaction he was going to get, Skyler pulled the phone away from his ear about good lengths away. He let all the loud happy yapping going on for a few seconds, he just had to smile.

_Good old Uncle Franz, he sure seemed to be happy one of his favorite 'nephews' was here to see him soon._

After it was done, he pulled his cell phone back to his ear. "Um- Yeah- I'll be there in the morning I think," Skyler said estimating a 'polite' time to drop by.

There was another buzz and questions.

The young con man sighed, "I'm in a real tight spot. It's Steve; he went M.I.A. since last month. I need help."

* * *

Sideswipe groaned in soreness on his berth of what happened to be the most painful spark pain he had ever received.

The silver bot looked at Ratchet, who was still hovering about the med bay, ever so delicately monitoring and scanning his condition every now and then. Still, he couldn't help but feel slightly woozy after the medic injected him with a drug through his energon wires. But at least now most of the ache was gone, just a few dull echoing throbs. He observed Red Alert recharging not too far away, in his alt-form of a Dodge Magnum SUV rescue vehicle. As for Jolt, the younger medic apprentice was mysteriously absent from the room.

Noticing his patient was now fully conscious Ratchet walked to the bot and hovered near him. "How are you Sideswipe?"

Sideswipe tried to sit up but Ratchet pushed him gently down again. "Sideswipe?" Ratchet asked again for a reply.

"I felt Sunny; he's alive… but…" Sideswipe said sure at first.

Ratchet optics were raised, "What is it, Sideswipe?"

Sideswipe gripped his chest plate below which his spark was and only could reply in a whisper, his face filled with a gaze of hurt, "He was in so much pain."

It was somewhat sore for Ratchet to hear that. While he had loathed all those times when the twins pranked with all their glory during the time the Autobots were together, to see Sideswipe in such a state and even hearing that Sunstreaker was suffering Primus knows where was something the medic had never wished for.

"If you could feel him, do you think he is nearby or on Earth?" the medic asked sternly, as he made more scans on the younger major twin.

"I… I don't know." Sides replied with uncertainty and remorse. "I can't feel the bond working well; it was only that sudden moment when I forced myself to find him through the bond. I couldn't feel him again after that."

Ratchet could not comment on that particular part, but he wasn't going to let his patient get worse.

Just as immediately Sideswipe's pain was on his face it was masked to the world, "How long before I can get to my duties?"

"24 hours rest, or you will not be leaving the med bay," the CMO sternly said, not giving any room for argument, and quickly went to the other side of the med bay to work on something else.

There was a growl from the younger mech, but Ratchet knew it was the normal reaction he could expect from him. He took a small glance back and saw that Sideswipe was lying on his berth again, resting. The medic sighed, wondering how much longer the younger twin was going to be like this. He was also having thoughts of making sure that Sideswipe did not attempt to force his way like he did all too soon. Ratchet was worried on the affects it would cause to Sunny, and the older twin's condition was not known.

:: Optimus Prime to Ratchet:: His leader's comm came in. :: How is Sideswipe? ::

:: Conscious and recovering, my Prime. :: Ratchet answered. :: Although there is something that is a mystery here. ::

:: A mystery? :: his leader's voice sound perplexed. :: What of? ::

As professionally as he could Ratchet said :: It seems when Sideswipe forced himself connecting his bond through his brother he received a static shock. It's a reaction that usually occurs when a bond is closed for a long time, although I have not seen one react so violently like those few hours ago. ::

:: So Sunstreaker is alive? :: Prime asked carefully, in his voice there was a sense of hope.

:: Yes, however, Sideswipe feels that Sunstreaker is very much in pain. We do not know how far he is or whether is in space or on Earth. That information of his location is unclear. We can only hope he is not in the hands of the Decepticons. ::

There was silence over the comm. link, Ratchet was aware Prime was in deep thought.

:: Have you have any news on the breach? :: Ratchet asked on another matter.

Optimus responded. :: Negative. It is only clear that Soundwave attempted to breach NEST's security, only to be stopped surprisingly by human hackers. ::

:: Human hackers? ::

:: Yes, an impressive feat that Prowl is rather unwilling to accept. :: Optimus said amused.

This of course made Ratchet worry for Prowl's 'special' condition. :: The fragger hasn't fried his circuits yet? ::

A deep chuckle was heard from the other. :: No, but he is close to. He's not happy either, since he still can not locate the hackers. ::

:: Order him to the med bay Optimus. Pit, I'd be lucky that he doesn't get an extensive damage repair. ::

There was a pause and then a response, :: He will arrive in the med bay in approximately seven minutes. ::

:: Thank you. Ratchet to Optimus, out. ::

* * *

A groan came from the unconscious form of the alien robot.

Skyler stepped a few feet back as the robotic alien's systems hummed to life. Even though he had plans to confront the bot, he couldn't help but feel a bit nervous. He was used to talking to it in its car form, and having something towering above you and talking to you was something not many people had experience with or counted around the norm. The young man hesitantly walked over slowly to make his presence known, at least in a non-threatening way and slowly locked his eyes on its optics.

It sat up using its arm for support.

"Uhh- Are you alright?"

There was that look again at him, being small and all. Not the Skyler was surprised, but he supposedly thought it was the same thing a human would do if they were talking to a stray cat or something. It was something to be expected of an alien that did not understand the human race.

"You could have run off, fleshy," it said simply.

Skyler replied back with a sigh, "I… I just couldn't."

"Why?"

Breathing nervously, he only said, "I know you abducted me and all. But- Well- Just because people may think I'm with the wrong crowd doesn't mean I'm heartless." Skyler then did a double take quickly, "Um- maybe in your terms 'sparkless'."

Sunstreaker did not really believe this was happening; this fleshling in front of him was actually forgiving the kidnapping? _Such a weird species._

"I know you're a thief and a trickster, organic." Sunny stated a bit threateningly as he saw the puny thing wince. "But it doesn't explain why you couldn't have run off when you were so keen to do so before. You're not being specific."

Skyler couldn't help but feel like a 5 year old being told off by his mom. _The bot read him like book! _His cursed to himself and his heart sped up. At times like this, maybe telling the truth was a better method, even if it was the censored version of it.

"Ok, personal question." Skyler said swiftly though there was an evident growl. "Would you happen to have a family member called Sideswipe?"

Hitting a soft spot, Sunstreaker immediately lunged at the organic and grabbed it with his hand none too lightly squeezing it. "What do you know about him?" the Autobot snapped. "I never told you anything about him! Speak NOW!"

"Ow, ow, ow!" the helpless young man shouted. "Ok, ok, ok! It's just- when you- fainted you were- calling out- to him- can you _please_ let me breathe?" Skyler made it clear he was going to die if he didn't get some oxygen in his lungs as he gasped for air. _Holy shit, bad timing to put gasoline on the fire._

While Sunny did relaxed his fingers more, he still kept his optics with a glare on the fleshling. "How did you know he was my family?"

_This organic better have a good excuse. _

Skyler gulped but he ended out in a desperate plea out of his mouth, "Well- If I was somewhere lost and think I was dying or fainting, the first thing I'd call for would be family." Afterwards, by reflex the young man only covered his head to expect a counter attack. But instead he was faced with silence.

Sunny was a bit stunned to hear the organic say that. But then again, he did pick this fleshling because it was not a dense one and it had skills. Intrigued to hear more, he asked again. "What does all of this have to do with my original question on why you stayed here and did not run off?"

"That's kind of hard to explain," the human said quietly. Knowing that he was going to be bombarded again, Skyler made a save, "Uh- If it's alright with you, can you unlock my laptop, give me 3 minutes to open it, and it will help me explain."

"Are you avoiding my question again, fleshly?" Sunstreaker accused.

Skyler snorted, "No, I'm not. It's just… Isn't it actually universal rule to offer a bit of yourself once in a while, before getting to know someone else?" He added in, "And I do have a name you know. It's Skyler, it's got nothing to do with flesh or organic, but I wouldn't mind if you called me a human. Do you have a name?"

Understanding an introduction was in order the bot only said, "Sunstreaker. A short version to Autonomous Robotic Organism would be Autobot. I'm a mech."

The young man blinked realizing the 'Superleggera' text had been replaced by Sunstreaker's name in the first place. It was possibly the reason why he moved in reverse without thinking and in surprise because Skyler had said his name without knowing it. Unexpected, the Autobot's hand turned to an open palm; he then plucked the bag that was lying on the ground and gave it to the young man. There was a slight boom of a sound and it ended abruptly.

"It's unlocked human," Sunny said sternly. "Three minutes and a good explanation. Hurry up."

The young man noted on what the bot said. _Being at least called a human was an improvement, even if it wasn't by name._ Perhaps the Autobot he was with now wasn't the one to really connect with people. Not wanting to waste time, his opportunity to survival, Skyler was feeling glad that his laptop was working perfectly right now and he went to find the specific file frantically.

Finding what he wanted, he expanded it to full screen and he faced the mech.

"Very well," Skyler exhaled a breath to prepare himself. "The reason why I couldn't and didn't run away was because I'm still on my mission to get to Kansas City. I'm searching for my only real family left. He's gone missing, I tried contacting him but I never got anything. His name is Steve." And with the explanation, he showed an enlarged picture of him and Steve on his laptop to the mech.

While all this time he followed Skyler around, maybe this was something that shocked Sunstreaker. In the picture two people were in it with one having his arm over the other's shoulder in a brotherly way. One of them was obviously Skyler, what Sunny didn't expect was to see that 'Steve' was identical to his brother. They were twins. Skyler was looking for his missing twin.

The human sighed, "It may sound weird but, I just couldn't get the feeling out of my head since he disappeared. I'm the older one and I should be the one to protect him, if he died or something it would be-"

"-like losing half of your soul." Sunstreaker finished.

Skyler blinked in awe when he heard it, "Yeah. How do you-"

"Sideswipe is my younger twin." Sunstreaker said clearly. "I've been trying to search for my kind, who are here on Earth. But the one I'm really searching is for Sides. We've been separated for eons. It's why I need to get to the military base in Nevada - they are there."

For what seemed to be a good deal of five minutes of silence, both human and Autobot were realizing they were both sharing the same sentiment all this time without knowing.

Uncomfortable with another wave of silence, this time it was Sunstreaker who started up the conversation with a sigh, "Aren't we going to continue to Kansas City like you planned, human?"

Smiling and thanking all the gods that existed, that the major hostilities were over, Skyler then explained, "We will be. But it's better to get some Intel before we go in, never know what enemies await. We're going to stop in Memphis for it."

Seeing over the situation, Sunstreaker also took it as a sign to warn the human of his own enemies. "Is it possible to arm yourself, human?"

This question of course caught the young man's attention, "Yes, was going to. Memphis is known for its high crime rates."

With that statement, it was true that the human was not aware of the war. "That was not what I was talking about."

"Huh?"

"Listen human, the reason why the Autobots are here on your planet because there is a war in my race. We have Decepticons as our enemies. They are like I am, but the will not hesitate to kill you if they see you." Sunstreaker warned. "And if they wish to capture you they will make your death long and painful."

Skyler didn't like hearing that, "So they're here to take over the planet?"

"Yes."

_Welcome Sky, you've just joined in the intergalactic robot war game! _

_Autobots VS Decepticons_

_Where's the exit? _

_There isn't any! _

_CRAP._

"We wouldn't be 'bumping' into them while we travel to Nevada won't we?" the young man hoped.

Sunny with a tone of hatred said, "Doubt it. I intercepted one of them when I landed on this planet. But the fragger ran away, though there's a chance he might come after me again. I was injured and taken by that 'tow truck' to other fleshling's garage mistaken for a stolen car."

Well, that made sense now on how Skyler was the one who ended up being tasked with doing the alien's paint job. "I guess I'll be getting some extra firepower when we get into Memphis," he said, already thinking and making plans. "How did this war started anyway?"

And with that, Sunstreaker explained a very short-hand version concerning the All Spark and how it found its way on Earth, the battle in Mission City, to recent events the bot recalled happened in Egypt. When he was finished, he didn't expect to see the human to look so angry because of it. It was clearly there in his body language, his fists were clenched until they were white, his face was serious and murderous.

"What's the matter, human?"

"It's all clear so now," Skyler said taking a breath to calm his nerves down, as he knew it was not best to lose it. "I only knew all this time that my parents and sister died in Mission City because of terrorists. I didn't believe it. So it was because of the Decepticons, and Steve is all I have left."

Sunstreaker was about to say something about it but he was stopped by the human.

Skyler looked at the bot squarely in the optics, "Thanks for telling the truth, Sunstreaker. It's more than enough and it's one huge weight off my back."

The Autobot did a slight nod and pressed on to important matters. "Shall we head to Memphis now? Dawn is coming."

"Yeah."

Watching Sunstreaker's transformation to a car with fascination, Skyler packed his laptop into his bag and headed over once the Autobot was done. The car door opened and he got inside (this time in the driver's seat), and put his seat belt on.

There was a growl of annoyance from the car.

"Sunstreaker, what's wrong?" Skyler asked worriedly.

"Pit, I got dirt all over me again. Stupid planet having dirt and moisture at the same time!" Sunny exclaimed.

This time the young man laughed freely without worry.

"WHAT ARE YOU LAUGHING AT?"

Skyler stopped and went back to a relaxed composure, "You. But I think we both need a clean-up. Don't worry, when we reach Memphis I have 'uncles', or what we humans call extended family. We're not related by blood but still are family. It's a shelter for us, so it's a wash and wax when we get there, promise."

"I'll hold you to your word, human. At least that's something to look forward to," Sunny snorted as he was now zooming back to the main road.

"I'll do what I can and help when I can."

Sunstreaker knew there was more to that, "With what?"

"Everything," Skyler plainly said. "Humans have a saying, 'The Enemy of my enemy is a friend. I'm pretty inclined to help you out."

"Revenge?" Sunny asked the most obvious thing.

"Yep, but more than that," Skyler hinted.

Sunstreaker didn't say anything to let the human know he was listening in.

"Look, we're both in ironically in a similar situation. So, you help me find my twin brother in Kansas City and he's coming with me when we travel to Nevada. In return, I'll help you find your kind, get to them, and help you find your twin if he's on Earth by _any and every_ means necessary."

"You sound serious, human."

"I am serious, mech." Skyler replied. "Call it a 'twin for a twin'."

Perhaps it was that moment that Sunstreaker understood about how his leader Optimus Prime had said in his first transmission that humans were 'More than meets the eye'. This human in particular which he kidnapped not too long ago was now an ally. Maybe it was the reason why the Decepticons were always driven back all this time, it was because the Autobots had support from the humans.

"Deal," Sunny called it even. "Which way is the shelter?"

"Head for the largest bridge and use that way," Skyler pointed.

"On it."

Out of general curiosity Skyler thought of something, "Say, Sunstreaker?"

"What?"

"You and Sideswipe are twins, so… did ya ever pull pranks on the other Autobots?" Skyler asked mischievously.

There was an arrogant laugh through the speakers. "Nearly all the time and we drove them mad."

_So, human twins do play pranks as well. _

_Highly beneficial._

"Well go on, spill." Skyler urged and added, "We could trade pranks."

_Perhaps this human he chose was the best one out of the lot. _

"Yes we could," Sunny chuckled and started on one of his favorites that targeted a certain strategist of the Autobots, Prowl.

* * *

Secretary of Defense John Keller was a very busy man.

Try as he might to find them, apparently the hackers that had been their saviors in defeating a Decepticon intelligence officer from the NEST security breach had disappeared as quickly as they came without so much as a trace that it even made Optimus' second in command Prowl, who was a very talented strategist, feel appalled. Yes, he was proud that humans could come to rival the Cybertronians, but the older man could not help be worried about who might have been the hackers. They did create somewhat of a show if not a major gossip online amongst other hackers, as it was a history in breaching national security under five minutes by the Decepticon.

But that wasn't the main show.

It wasn't until two unknown hackers not known from which source had come in and encoded in a very complex if not extremely random encryption that was very difficult to discern even by the government intelligence officers. Many had expected that they were taking the opportunity to attack the government along with the Decepticons for an easy picking. However the security firewall was suddenly beefed up into something they had never seen before. After what seemed to be the most intense ten minutes of an all out hacker war of Soundwave versus the hackers, the hackers were victorious in the end.

But they never found the hackers, and that was the real problem now.

Over two months into the search, it was fast becoming a lost cause.

Glen Whitman and Maggie Madsen with their team were constantly checking through many hacker websites on the off chance that they might get to find any clues. The two were now officially working under him since Mission City '07. So far, the only thing that was known about the two hackers were their usernames, _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_ and _RecordatioFurtaCorona2_. Many of the hackers online had dubbed them the Furta Duo, perhaps the only similar thing they had in common amongst the two usernames.

Finding them was actually the least of his worries, the fearful fact of what might happen if the Decepticon Soundwave went after them was far more frightening.

From the stand of the central intelligence room of the Pentagon, watching many teams of Intel officers working around the clock to find them, John Keller was aware there would be many more sleepless nights for them.

* * *

_About a half an hour later of driving…_

They soon arrived in a more plentiful area of where the humans lived. To Sunstreaker, he presumed that it was probably where humans with a more elite status would live. It was very smart living among them when his human's family was the thieves themselves. Yet, maybe there was more to what the whole place looked like. Another few seconds, they entered the gates of what seemed a large sized house.

In front of the house, was a large tall and well built African-American man.

Skyler parked in front of him, got out, and gave the man a hug.

"DAMN, BOY! That is some SWEET ride you got there!" Uncle Franz shouted as he shifted his sunglasses down to see the car. "Where and how did you steal that? I missed you little rascal."

Sunstreaker noted that humans can be very loud. _Frag it._ _This one in particular hurt his audio receptors._

"Missed you too. I didn't steal him," Skyler smiled, "More of he _stole_ me." _Alien abduction would be more like it._

Franz of course only stared at Skyler knowing he wasn't going to get any more clues than that. "Mmm, Well, at least you haven't gone rusty, Sky. Park the sweet guy in the main garage. I'll meet you down there in a few minutes."

"I stole you? That's your explanation?" Sunny exclaimed as Skyler got in.

Skyler shrugged, "It's not like he's going to believe I got kidnapped by an extra terrestrial being. He's a hard core facts person, he's not gonna buy it."

As they drove off into the garage area, Sunstreaker commented, "Never thought humans were loud enough to hurt my audio receptors."

"You're telling me?" Skyler laughed. "I still keep my cell phone about a meter away from my ear when he does that. Turn over there, and head down."

Sunny did so to find out he was going down two floors. "So it's an underground garage?"

"Nope, even better," the young man said. "It's an underground warehouse, garage, and equipment facility."

As Sunstreaker rolled in the place it was probably big enough to fit a small army of humans in there. He took in the numerous cupboards that he scanned to find weapons, various materials, explosives, costumes and many other tools. They even passed about 12-20 cars parked before they found an empty slot at the end of the line. And there they waited for Franz.

Stunned Sunny could only say, "You have very resourceful Uncles, you know that? Your family doesn't seem to be ordinary thieves."

"The term we use is Con Man or Con Men if it's plural." Skyler explained. "Not 'Con as in Decepticon, the name exists since the late 1800s so it doesn't come from your enemy. It's an abbreviation for Confidence Man. Higher class of thieves you could say."

"So what does your Uncle Franz and Uncle Neil do? They don't seem to be the ones who do the actual stealing." Sunstreaker noted knowing how lavish the house looked from the outside.

The young man paused for a moment before he continued, "Uncle Franz is a weapons specialist as well as an explosives specialist. His role is more of the one doing the blowing up to places where you can't get to and usually for diversions in getting out of the heist for the exit strategy. Usually it's a more detailed and planned out heist done in a larger group, takes more time, but usually the goods are higher in the stakes."

Sunstreaker was impressed. _I kidnapped the right human after all._ He then asked, "How about your Uncle Neil?"

"He's a _Fixer_."

"Fixer?" confusion evident in the sound of the car radio speaker. _Humans needed to get fixed?_

"Another term con mans use for suppliers." Skyler said. "You need it, he gets it. Information, costumes, tools, other contacts etc. You can probably now guess why there are a lot of other things around here apart from the weapons."

"Hmm. I see."

Franz was coming down by the stairs. Skyler quickly got out of the driver seat and asked Sunny, "Do you need anything?"

"That wash and wax would be good right now," Sunny said in a lower volume.

Skyler chuckled at that. "Other than that?"

Sunstreaker swiftly said before he couldn't talk anymore as the other human was approaching. "Any classified information on my kind."

"Alright, I'll see what I can find. Rest up; I'll be back in a few hours with everything. Take care of my laptop, I'll leave it with you," Skyler whispered to the car and immediately scooted and dragged his uncle away from it, saving Sunstreaker from inspection.

"I prefer that the car doesn't get touched." Skyler said rapidly getting Uncle Franz's attention away.

Franz of course looked at his 'nephew' in confusion, "Are you becoming a car junkie?"

"I could use a jet water pump, car polish, and wax later on," his so called nephew said playfully. He went to other matters. "Is Uncle Neil home?"

"Upstairs, boy."

Silently thanking Skyler yet again for not getting into trouble with other humans around him, Sunstreaker eased himself down knowing he was at least a lot safer underground than on the streets as he scanned the two humans went up the stairs.

He then went into recharge.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 1.04: Understanding a Human_

_Planet Earth, City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_I suppose this was what was Big Boss telling about how these 'humans' were 'more than meets the eye'. It was really unexpected how just a few hours ago we were glaring at one another and now we're allies. Pit, we're trading prank plans!_

_Yet, maybe the real reason we came together like this because we were both suffering the same thing. I wasn't sure how a human twin bond actually worked since they didn't have sparks like a Cybertronian, but Skyler's way of describing the loss of his twin was the same. We are both looking for the same missing person, our twin. The way he had promised that he was going to do everything to search for my twin was amazing, even sure of it. In a way it was like a boost of hope I had so long ago lost in finding Sides that I realized protecting this human was going to be my most important task. _

_Having a human with me was probably the best distraction I've had from the so called 'organic' muck I had been worried about. I'm actually having thoughts of not caring that the others would find it a hilarious thing for me having a 'pet'. Well, they could laugh all they want or care. It's not like they'll expect a 'human' prank to be played on them when I get back. The little puny thing is a creative little bugger; I think I'll get Sides to join in if and when I find him._

_Franz's place was very resourceful no doubt, the human had weapons and materials for them in what seemed to be his 'garage', which to normal humans would be like an underground bunker below some elite housing. The size of it was probably enough for me to stand in my bi-pedal form without bumping my head on the ceiling. The other human Neil wasn't in sight yet, but I probably shouldn't expect any less. I guess Skyler wasn't exaggerating the fact that he had good networks wherever he went. _

_Regrets abducting a very resourceful human twin?_

_Only in the beginning. _

_Not now._

_I think I'm going to like my stay on Earth._

_~ Sunny _

_   
_

* * *

_  
_

**TBC…**


	5. 1st Day of Intel, Rest and Prep the Mission

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently the site seems to have problems with the central alignment, so excuse me if the format is not the same as the previous chapters. Once everything is back in gear I'll fix it.
> 
> I've uploaded a few more recent chapters.
> 
> Enjoy!

* * *

 

  


  
**~ Chapter 5: 1st Day of Intel, Rest and Prep the Mission ~**   


  


 

**   
**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 1.05: Intel Collecting_

_City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_   
_

_So here I was in Memphis, overblown with the fact that my life would never again be normal. Well, it wasn't normal at first because I was already Con man, but to add in an intergalactic war of Robotic organisms the Autobots and the Decepticons with humans in the mix?_

_It was another level of insanity. _

_Well, Sky, you just hit the jackpot._

_Still, I was glad Sunstreaker was with me, alien or not. I suppose going alone to _   
_find and/or rescue _   
_Steve wasn't really what you _   
_ would _   
_call a good plan. _   
_More like _   
_the most idiotic. Two masterful minds are better than one, and having _   
_any kind of _   
_backup _   
_was better than none _   
_at all. _

_That morning I got a huge lecture, courtesy of Uncle Franz, about Steve. Thankfully Uncle Neil came in by breakfast and saved me from god knows how many hours of excess voice volume. I know Uncle Franz is concerned about Steve, but simply shouting wasn't really a solution. I pretty well knew that it was his nature - many of my uncles said it came from the fact that _   
_he's _   
_an explosives expert. Uncle Basher is one too, but he's more the expressive type, not loud, poetic even, like a series of timed explosives blowing off in an orchestrated sequence. _

_Uncle Neil, on the other hand, was one of my favorite uncles, more or _   
_less _   
_because he was one of my mentors. He was the Guru, I was the apprentice, or call it the Jedi and the Padawan. Take your pick. He was the reason why I had extensive networks and he knows about nearly everything that's going on and what things are. Kind of like a walking Wikipedia, but don't ask about animals, especially about cats. He has a phobia about cats. Don't know how he got it, and I'm not asking. _

_Being the true 'fixer' that he is, Uncle Neil dragged me to his 'Intel' room. It's a room that he designed to have his CPU data running on a field of exabytes (that's about a million terabytes). Trust me, it's any hacker's or computer geek's wet dream. While he didn't have anything on Steve yet, even though he was working on the case, he did have a couple of DVDs about some government/hacker scam about aliens. Uncle Neil said the weird part was the fact that the information all _   
_leads_   
_ to a certain individual. _

_I think his name was Sam something, with a 'W' for his surname. _

_Was it Witicky, Witkiky, or Witwity? Uh, I'll check on it later. There was also another person called Leo Spitz, and a known hacker by the username Robowarrior. Of course the unlikely thing I found out was that they were all connected to each other for some reason. _

_Coincidence?_

_YEAH, RIGHT. _

_That was like saying to Isaac Newton an apple falls because of magic, not gravity._

_This I HAD to check out. _

_~ Sky _

_   
_

* * *

_   
_

 

In a large spacious room with a CPU with ten monitors combined to act as one large screen, both the fixer and young con man began their search on any leads to Steve's whereabouts or any information about what he was doing before he disappeared. Uncle Neil was typing away, searching his database on what was going on in Kansas City for the last two months. Skyler in particular was looking around the vast storage area of external hard drives neatly labeled with various information, records, e-books, and many other things of interest that were kept on the shelves.

Skyler was very sure that nearly all the information here had something to do with the long Cons that his con man family had worked on in the past or were working on right now. Also present was a shelf of external hard drives filled with an infinite amount of e-books that covered certain jobs like medical personnel, law makers, casino pit bosses, and even security technicians. The extensive information was making Skyler drool, as he pretty much considered himself an info and detail junkie.

He then went to a certain shelf of DVDs and plucked out the 'alien' scam videos that his uncle mentioned to him.

"So how did you get your hands on this stuff anyway?" Skyler asked as he looked on the DVD discs. "These are absolutely recorded with protection on them."

Neil only looked at his adopted nephew and gave him a shrug. "I got them about a year ago from a site called the 'real effing deal dot com' and other various hidden alien scam webs." He immediately waved a warning finger at his student. "Whatever you do, don't watch them when you have online connection. Or, if you want to do analysis on it, hook it up with a DVD player and use a laptop without net connection for it. It's safer that way."

"Sounds really fishy. How come?" the younger said as he glanced at the elder, looking for an explanation.

"Well, Sky, there are rumors going around about it. Apparently the government doesn't want to let the public know what they're really doing. We all know that part."

"So what happens if you play it when your connection is online?" Skyler questioned.

The late 40s year-old blond Caucasian man smiled. "Proud to see you getting better at spotting details, Sky. But back to your second question. The government has somehow created an undetectable worm or virus that's active online. Oddly enough, it's harmless to any other sort of files. Yet when you play the videos on those DVDs with a media player while you're online, they're permanently wiped out. Effects edited ones as well, so there's no means of getting the data back."

Skyler blinked. That certainly was odd, yet very tactful and effective. "Did you get anything behind the scenes?"

"Apart from the fact the 'effing deal' site is owned by Leo Spitz, whose college roommate is that kid the government said got scammed by a hacker?" replied Neil. The man thought for a moment. "No, not much."

"But 'not much' _is something,_" Skyler inquired.

Neil sighed, "Not what I would say useful."

"Just because you don't think it's useful doesn't mean it'll stay that way after you put the pieces together," the younger pointed out.

Neil sighed again. "There isn't anything else."

Skyler wasn't going to give up. "Alright then, how about the details and facts? Forget about linking them now, we'll focus on what has already happened."

"I can't."

"You can," Skyler said stubbornly.

"No, I can't."

"You could do it. You're the best there is." Skyler affirmed confidently.

The uncle pulled the warning finger again, "Don't flatter."

Skyler rolled his eyes feeling annoyed, "I gave this up years ago, and it's more of Steve's job, but… Are you going to make me whine?"

Neil laughed, "You're so like your father, kid. Taylor kept pestering and always persisted in getting every single bit of information from me, since he didn't like how I hid information that isn't important and has little chance of importance."

"You're still doing it now," Skyler pointed out with his arms crossed.

"Skyler-"

"You know what? Maybe I should go to the pet store and get a nice fluffy hyperactive kitten for you," the younger con man suggested, using a known phobia of his uncle. "Uncle Franz doesn't mind pets…"

_Time for carnage. _

With a slight glint of fear in the elder's eye, he gazed upon the youth uncertainly, "What are you trying to do?"

A shrug. "Blackmail you."

"You're blackmailing your mentor and uncle?" he asked, not really believing what he heard.

"Yeah," Skyler said, giving his mentor a serious look.

"I don't like it."

"Isn't that why it's called blackmail? You're not supposed to like it."

Neil grumbled, "Little rascal."

"You know you love me, uncle," Skyler beamed.

Weighing his options on not to explain or go against something he couldn't stand/feared, Neil gave up with a sigh. "Fine. What information do you want?"

_Skyler: 1, Uncle Neil: 0_

"Everything," Skyler said and he then listed them off. "Mission City, anything to do with those videos like in Shanghai, '09 hacker scam about aliens, Robowarrior, and maybe more about the people or organization known to be involved with the guy called Sam."

Neil paused for a moment remembering where he put the data.

"All the information is in external drive code 0709NBE-X27. It's in the government section shelf on the second shelf to your left, third row, located in the 1st column," Neil said in a clear voice.

"Thanks," Skyler said as he went to the indicated shelf to get it.

Raising his voice so Skyler can hear him, Neil asked, "May I ask why you're suddenly searching for an odd rumor?"

"Well, I have a friend who's going to help me find Steve. I'm just doing something for him in return," Skyler responded lightly as he took the external drive in hand and headed back to his uncle. "A trade for a trade."

Confused, the elder asked, "And he needs information on a government hacker scam of aliens?"

"He said it's important to him." Skyler said with a straight face.

Knowing that Skyler had not mentioned the name of his friend, Neil took it as a sign not to poke into it too deep. It must be important. If not Skyler would not act this way. "Skyler?"

"Yes, Uncle Neil?"

Trying to approach the subject carefully, Neil took a breath and said, "Just be careful with that one, ok? It may seem harmless but it's a very tight secret being covered up."

"How so?" Skyler asked suspiciously. Although he was already certain it would be.

_Who wouldn't cover up about alien robots about to do the megalomaniac thing? _

"You remember the site I mentioned? Real effing deal dot com?"

The younger con man nodded.

"After the whole fiasco about some military test gone wrong in Egypt, the site was closed down by Leo Spitz himself. That was at the request of the government," Neil confirmed. "And that very same day it closed, the virus started."

Skyler was silent. _Shit, that is one major cover up. _

Neil sighed, "I know you're an adult now, but be careful what you dig up in the information or archives, alright? Once you're in, there's a possibility you can't step back." Next he stood up from his seat from the computer and put his hands on Skyler's shoulders, "We'll find Steve somehow, but make sure you don't lose yourself before you get back to your brother, understood? All the guys in the family would be sad to lose the both of you, especially after we lost your father, mother, and lil' Scarlet to the terrorist attack in Mission City."

"I know, I'll do what it takes to keep myself alive and find Steve. Promise."

Satisfied, Neil let go of his nephew and looked at what he was carrying. "Good. Now, how about you burn those DVDs to some extra discs… And yes, Skyler, you may take whatever info you need from this room to help you in your search for Steve."

"How did you know I wanted to ask that?" The young one blinked. "You can read minds now?"

The elder chuckled and playfully nudged his nephew, "No. But who do you think helped your father give you your name?"

"You, Uncle Danny, Uncle Robert, and Uncle Rusty," Skyler said as he rolled his eyes irritated. While he was proud of it (the name came from Dutch origins and it meant guarded and scholar), it was an inside joke amongst his uncles because his dad wasn't sure that he was going to have a baby boy or a girl, so he picked a unisex name for their first child. They didn't expect twins, so Steve got the better, 'masculine' name. It kind of offended Skyler in a way that he could have ended up as a girl.

_Skyler: 1, Uncle Neil: 1_

The younger con man went back into the archives, quickly selecting things that he wanted to study while getting away from his uncle for a bit and a few he wanted for Sunstreaker. _What would an Autobot be interested in learning about Earth?_ Skyler had never thought to ask, so he took a more general approach by guessing through what he had seen. Searching the various shelves, he picked up a Multi-language dictionary, weapons list and army machines, martial arts and other things that the bot might want to learn. He neatly put them in a plastic box to make carrying them easy. As an afterthought, he took a couple of new, unused DVDs he could burn from the rack, then headed for the door.

"Hey, Sky?" his uncle called.

Turning back, Skyler looked at Uncle Neil. "What?"

"I mentioned to Franz that you've improved that 'fighting' of yours," he winked mischievously.

Skyler nearly dropped his plastic box. "You didn't!"

"Did so, kid. Live with it," Neil laughed loudly. "He's demanding a rematch with you after you clean your car. Last time you slammed on him pretty good. Even without me reminding him, he would have remembered at some point. I'm only helping you get over it on your first day. Better now than on your last day here."

"Tch, crap," the younger muttered, realizing he didn't have a choice in that matter.

_Skyler: 1, Uncle Neil: 2_

"Come on, Sky. You know you could put up a good fight with him," Neil urged.

Skyler frowned at his uncle. "What part don't you understand that what I use is _only_ for defensive purposes?"

"The fact that it looks cool and you use more brains than brawn?" Neil hinted. "When you like something, doesn't mean you need to understand it."

A pause, and then a sigh, "As much as I like hearing that, please don't go and start another family sparring war like last time…"

"Fine, fine. It's just you and Franz." Neil admitted. "Go on and do what you need to do. I'll see what I can get on Steve."

Skyler made his way to the door without looking back.

_Looks like it's too soon to take on Uncle Neil. _

_He's testing me, no doubt about it. _

As Skyler made his way downstairs to the basement, he got a trolley to carry his heavy load and headed to the cupboards that housed the car cleaning supplies. His thoughts were very much on how the elder, more experienced man was trying to bait him. Of course all the younger ones of their 'family' knew it was a sign they would soon be called in to do the real long cons with the big guys. Skyler remembered vaguely Uncle Robert telling him how his son (Skyler's eldest cousin) Linus was called in to do the Bellagio heist at the age of 22 (Skyler was 11), despite being dubbed as 'the Rookie' of the team.

The younger con man was actually grateful that there was a chance to be recruited to do a job with the legendary con men. Well, he did have a Con family 'Caldwell' name to live up to. _Hmm, 'Skyler Caldwell'._ It didn't sound so bad, but the fact that he was so used to using the name 'Skyler Knight' made it sound unusual to him. At least with his first name there really wasn't much of a change, Uncle Robert on the other hand was 'Bobby Caldwell'. Supposedly because he already had a legendary status amongst the others, he had two different names, which was expected. But Skyler still had to find Steve; he just couldn't stomach the idea of doing a major heist without him.

Sighing, the young man took a water pump, brushes, wax, polish and other necessary equipment from the supply cupboard.

He'd have to think about that later. After all…

Skyler had an Autobot to wash and wax.

* * *

_Moments later…_

Both Autobot and the human had the 'garage' pretty much to themselves that morning as the cleaners were already headed out of the place when Skyler came in.

With no one around, Sunstreaker was awake to see Skyler bring in what he had requested. He let the boy get the laptop and bag that was inside his interior and watched with interest as the human hooked up an external drive to the laptop plus another laptop that was in the storage area to burn the discs. The Autobot figured it must be the data the human mentioned getting. Knowing the human tech loading times were slower than the equivalent Cybertronian tech, Sunny easily guessed that he would soon get what he had wanted the most. Wash and wax.

_Primus, that waiting took long enough! _

Skyler, on the other hand, watched the Autobot with amused attention as he washed his new friend. When he used the brush with soap to clean off the excess dirt, the Autobot sounded like he was…purring? Rather than laugh out loud (fearing that it wouldn't be polite), the young con man kept his thoughts to himself and merely grinned seeing that his handiwork satisfied the bot.

Taking a small bucket and a small stool ladder, Skyler began applying soap to the car's roof. "Sunstreaker? I've been meaning to ask you something…"

A snappy reply made it clear the Autobot was trying to enjoy the wash without interruptions. "What, human?"

"Well, I never got to ask you about the paint job that I did. I always ask for my customer's feedback. How is it?" Skyler asked.

There was a pause, then a curt reply. "Adequate."

Not really believing his ears - was the first time someone had said that in a long time - the boy repeated the word. "Adequate?"

Sunstreaker merely huffed, "I usually _don't_ give feedback to _any_ Autobot about paint jobs, human. Consider yourself lucky."

_Like Pit he was going to_   
_ step so casually over his ego to_   
_ say it was 'great' or 'cool'. _

_Or even thank _   
_the human about the part of escaping his 'lime green fate'. _

Skyler understood that Sunstreaker was the 'difficult' type of customer. _Perhaps Autobots have higher standards? Most likely._

"Alright, I'll try and do better next time then," Skyler replied. "I'll make sure you're impressed!"

"Whatever, human," Sunny said, inwardly thinking the human didn't know the meaning of giving up.

"You don't mind if I take a picture of you?" Skyler asked again.

Slightly curious about why the humans had been taking pictures of his alt-form since they reached Louisiana, Sunny asked, "What is it with you humans and taking pictures? All those other fleshlings have been taking pictures of my alt-form since we started this trip."

Skyler noted that Sunstreaker used the word fleshlings on the humans that were a 'bother' to him. Maybe for the Autobot to call him a 'human' showed that Sunstreaker was still not looking at other humans equally. _Pretty much showed the bot wasn't 'warm' to __everyone__._

"You could say many of us don't exactly have computerized memories or data banks, so sometimes we forget," the younger con man tried explaining, making sure it was something tech related for the Autobot. "Taking a picture is usually regarded as saving a good memory. But, sorry for asking, what is an alt-form?"

"It stands for Alternate Form, the form that I am now in. My real form or as a mech is called a bipedal form," Sunny responded as it was the most obvious thing for him. "I scanned one when I arrived on your planet, it's a disguise to live in plain sight."

The con man was surprised by this. "So you can scan any vehicle and you get that exterior and interior look?"

"As long as it matches my mass, yes. Back to my question, human."

Thinking, Skyler rubbed the roof area for a while before he replied. "Hmm, just say that your form is an elite vehicle for humans. It's a high class brand. Not everyone can buy them; usually only professional racers have one. It's why everyone wants a picture of you."

Sunstreaker actually liked the sound of that. His form was elite. Well, he was the best. What better form could he get? However, there was something on his processor that bugged him…

"Why do you want to take a picture of me? Do you easily forget?" the Autobot questioned.

Skyler chuckled as he got down the ladder still leaving the bucket on top, "Me? Easily forget? Not really. It's a habit I have for a paint job man; I usually take pictures of every car I do my job on. Every one of them is my work of art." The human was now rubbing the side of the bot's door.

This of course made Sunny think of his own past before the war when he used to paint. It was something that the bot had liked to do, but after the war started, everything just came down in shambles and he never had the mood or inspiration to paint again. Every day was all about fighting 'Cons, patrols and the endless war.

"So, you can paint?"

Uncomfortably the youth replied, "I used to. I even wanted to get a degree for it, since I sucked at other arts like music and sculpting." A pause. "But after my parents and my sister died… I kind of lost it. I only do paint jobs on cars now. Not official paintings."

Wanting to get rid of the awful mood in the room, Sunstreaker slightly tipped his body weight to the side with a mischievous intent.

'_SPLASH!' _

Unfortunately for the con man youth, he was directly beneath the bucket on the ladder.

"SHIT! SUNSTREAKER! WHAT WAS THAT FOR?"

Knowing and happy that he'd hit a nerve he only replied, "For laughing at me last time. Besides, you reek of dirt, human. You need a wash."

"And you douse that human with car soap?" Skyler asked skeptically feeling tetchy as he was dripping wet. "It's not really an effective solution, mech."

Sunstreaker laughed at him. "Not effective, but it does the job. I'm not letting a dirty human wax me when I'm all cleaned up."

"Very funny, Sunstreaker," the youth said with sarcasm as he rolled his eyes.

"I do find it funny, human," the bot said in a tone of laughter.

Wanting to get revenge, Skyler thought quickly. "Are you requesting for cold water for the wash?"

Sunny paused. "Is that a threat?"

Skyler with no mercy turned the water pump on cold water at full blast.

"YOU AFT' HOLE HUMAN! PIT! IT'S SLAGGIN' COLD!"

"Hah! Says the bot who didn't listen to the so-called threat by the human," Skyler smirked.

However, the younger con man's victory was cut short. Somehow Sunstreaker managed to stretch on the heels of his tires and swing his body to the side, brutally dumping bubbly soap all over Skyler to the that point he looked like a 'Soap-man' snowman.

Sunstreaker's laughs were now louder.

"This is a Soap War, Autobot!" Skyler declared pointing at the car.

Taking on his smaller opponent, Sunny was happy to engage. "Bring it, human! You can't defeat me in your entire life-cycle!"

And so the 'Soap War' of the human VS Autobot started…

* * *

_Much later on…_

To the Autobot's disgruntlement, the one victorious in the end was the human.

_The Son of a glitch was just too good at blackmailing. _

_Slag it. _

Regrets of kidnapping a smart human that had a knack for blackmailing?

_Yup, too bad it was part of the 'smart' human package._

Despite the fact that the whole area where they were was soaked and Skyler had to sweep the water to the drains in the floor, Sunstreaker ended up in defeat as the human was going to refuse to wax and polish if he didn't declare defeat. And so he did. Sunny wasn't really going to care about losing a water war with a human when it came to threaten his exterior, which to him was more important. The Autobot would just have to get his revenge some other time.

After the wash plus the polish, Sunstreaker was much left being squeaky clean and shiny for that day. He allowed Skyler to take a picture of him in return for the promise to show his other works later on when they had free time. The human was in a better mood (dry in his new clothes after a shower), had his lunch and he was checking on all the data that successfully had been copied to his laptop. The original DVDs were returned, leaving the copies ready to watch.

All of a sudden, the human's cell phone rang. The human looked at it, cringed, then set his cell phone a good distance away from his ear before pressing the receive button.

Sunstreaker, clearly knowing who it was, lowered the sensitivity of his audio receptors to half the original volume.

"BOY! WHERE ARE YOU? IT'S TIME FOR OUR FIGHTIN' MATCH!" The tone was loud and chipper, obviously it was the human's uncle named Franz on the cell phone line.

Quickly, the boy replied that he was in the 'garage' and he'd get everything prepared there. Rapidly afterwards, he punched the close call button.

Once Sunny had set his audio receptors back to their full function he asked Skyler what he meant by the match, but the human seemed reluctant to answer.

"You humans spar from time to time?" Sunny asked with curiosity, hoping he would get an answer.

Skyler heaved a long sigh. "Mostly martial arts or what you call self-defense. It's handy when you're in high-rate crime cities."

Sunstreaker noted the human's tone. "You don't look like you're looking forward to it."

"I'm not. You see, Uncle Franz has a bad habit of challenging other people who don't use karate for martial arts. He kind of makes it his business to test someone's worthiness. My bad luck, I happen to fall into that category." Skyler revealed his thoughts.

"Your uncle _is_ the loudest and weirdest fleshling I've ever seen," the Autobot stated.

"Tell me about it. If he could only understand it himself," Skyler huffed. "I better get ready and get the mats and protection guards."

Not long after the call both of his uncles came down. For Sunstreaker, it was the first time he saw Uncle Neil. By the way he was talking about being the referee and the rules to both contenders, the Autobot was very reminded of how Bumblebee would report things he found out on his mission to Optimus Prime. While the human called him a 'fixer', Sunny clearly saw he was some sort of scout or at most like an Intel officer.

Not acquainted with human types of self-defense or fighting, the warrior in Sunstreaker was curious to see how humans fought. They had changed clothes for such the occasion, perhaps it was better and easier to fight with them. In particular, he was interested in how the younger con man was going to go against his nearly double in size uncle. Sunny was a bit worried by how thin Skyler looked compared to his massive tall uncle. How was the puny human going to pull this off? Sunny would just have to wait and see. At least he got a clear view from the front seat, as they had positioned the mats in front of him.

And so the battle started. Sunstreaker for one was not really impressed with Franz's fighting style that much. It was similar to what's the Autobots use for basic fighting, and he had seen those styles from many mechs that used strength and physical agility. Heck, he used a couple of those movements thousands of times. By what Sklyer had mentioned, this was the 'karate' style.

What caught Sunny's attention was the style that Skyler was using.

While Sunstreaker had no idea what it was called, it was intriguing that Skyler was facing someone twice his size and was doing fairly, if not winning, without using much effort. It was as if it were flawless. The Autobot warrior had noted that the younger human's style was more evasive and defensive-based compared to his offensive uncle. Even so, the counterattack of every move was not wasted, but controlled, and done in a wave of motion that flowed outward, ultimately bringing the opponent to the ground and locking them to the point of excruciating pain. None of the moves were made to kill, but one could get really painful injuries if they were not skilled at going against such a style. Delightedly, Sunstreaker was actually proud that Skyler had won and applauded the show silently.

Leaving in disappointment and in defeat Franz went up to get himself a drink. Neil congratulated Skyler with a pat on the shoulder before he went up to join Franz to make sure he didn't drink too much. Skyler breathed out as he was glad the short match was over, then took the mats and everything else back before changing to a black t-shirt and black jeans.

Skyler returned to what he was supposed to be doing, back on his laptop watching the DVDs and using another program to zoom in on what seemed to be parts of robot bodies or - if the robot was visible enough - to zoom in on them and let the software enhance it. Once there were enough samples of what he considered robot parts, the young man encoded the software to detect, capture the picture and enhance it to the best possible zoom size. He pressed the enter button to let the laptop do the work.

Sunstreaker, waiting for the results, still had his curiosity caught up in the previous match. "Hey, human."

"Anything I could help you with, Sunstreaker?" While he was not looking at Sunny, Skyler did make his voice louder to say he was with open ears, as he took a video projector from a particular cabinet to set up with his laptop so the Autobot could see the enlarged results from a portable projection screen.

"What fighting style were you using against your uncle?" Sunstreaker questioned intently. "I've seen your uncle's style in many battles before, but I never have seen the style that you use."

Skyler turned around, "It's called Aikido. Considering you're a warrior bot, I suppose you probably noticed it's a defensive martial art."

"But it's pretty impressive you managed to force someone larger than you down without much effort. How is it possible?" Sunny pressed.

The young man smiled, "I never forced my uncle, Sunstreaker. He did it on his own."

"What? That doesn't make sense!"

"Hmm," Skyler scratched his head. "Well the best explanation to the style is that it's a pacifist art. Aikido translates roughly as 'the way of peace'."

"Peaceful?" Sunny scoffed. "You did real damage to your uncle!" The Autobot had eons of experience and finding something like this was unbelievable.

"That's the special part of the style, Sunstreaker." Skyler pointed out. "It's only meant for self-defense, so it focuses on evading, unarming, using your opponent's strength back at themselves and locking down the attacker. I don't attack, I accept the attack, and it's my attacker's fault for attacking that he gets hit with his own strength instead."

"A good defense can be considered the best offense," Sunstreaker concluded even though he wasn't sure how anyone could 'accept' an attack willingly. "So how widely used is this style you use?"

"Hmm, not as popular as karate or other martial arts I suppose, but all ages can start with it and use it effectively. Even the original person who made this style, when he was about 80 or a grandpa, could still manage to bring down two of his younger students without effort," the younger man explained the details.

Highly impressed on the facts, Sunstreaker thought maybe it was something he could learn that could be useful in fighting 'Cons who were larger in size when it came to close combat. Even if it was considered a pacifist art, perhaps taking a large opponent down in a lock was a good idea and made it easier to go for the kill afterward. Decepticons in particular were numerous and many were large. It was something he could resort to if the target wasn't going down so easily with long ranged weapons or speed wasn't enough.

"Human, do you have any data on this style?"

Skyler grinned, "Yeah. If you want to learn I have an e-book and videos on it. I bet you can take more of the difficult Decepticons down with this martial art."

"Sure. I'd like to learn this to take more 'Cons down! I could teach it to Sides later," the Autobot's tone was ecstatic.

"So how do I get the data to you?" the young con man asked.

Sunstreaker explained briefly that all he needed was the memory chip that humans called a USB, he then said to Skyler to plug it in a port in his interior. Skyler wasn't sure at first, but he did what he was told as he stored the information that the Autobot wanted, and looked into his interior to find a USB port. The human figured that perhaps the bot was pretty flexible to replicate technology inside them and their exterior. It only took a moment to take all the information from the plugged USB.

Thinking how Skyler was actually proficient in doing many things, Sunny asked, "So, have you ever joined in the military? You're smarter than you look and can fight."

For the first time, Skyler realized it was the Autobot's _real_ first compliment that he was silent before he could answer.

"Well, I nearly got in." There was disappointment, but it vanished quickly. "I failed the health test because I don't have good stamina by military standards, and my morale was kind of low because I didn't like following orders that didn't make sense," Skyler shrugged. "As cool it would have been as I was filed to be positioned as a sniper, being in the army isn't as thrilling like being a thief or a con man. There's more freedom in what to do, too."

Sunstreaker chuckled at that, "Trickster to the end, human?"

"Yeah, and I'm damn proud of it." The human said with pride and doing a 'peace' sign with his fingers.

'_**BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!'**_

Seeing that the analysis was finally over, Skyler dashed for the laptop and clicked on the sorting option to get all the ones that appeared to be the same in one folder. He kept the folder holding all the alien rumors opened in case he needed it to do some extra searching. He activated the video projector and pressed the 'Fn' button so it would show up on the projection screen.

"Looks like we've got everything sorted out of the videos," Skyler looked at the statistics. "About 25 percent of the detection samples failed. That leaves us with a good amount of data confirmed. Which data would you wish to get first?"

Sunstreaker looked at the folders labeling about a good number of the successful identified ones, "Take the largest one, human. We'll start from there."

"Alright, we'll start with the one that has the most appearances," the young man typed up zooming in many pictures to see a very large and black figure.

Skyler was now aware it was an Autobot at least, as it was fighting beside the humans. The analysis that he had for the approximate height was about 22-23 ft, black in color, and what really shocked Skyler were the canons on its arms. They were FREAKIN' HUGE. This bot was probably some sort of heavy artillery person or a heavy hitter.

"You know him?" Skyler asked seeing as the Autobot beside him was silent.

There was an evident snort, "He's an Autobot alright. I suppose the 'aft has been on nearly every raid on the 'Cons since he's the first one to show up out of all bots."

"Who is he?"

"Ironhide, the Autobot's Weapon specialist," Sunstreaker said with disdain. "Who else could it be?"

Skyler gaped, "Wait, isn't he the dude you and Sideswipe pranked and you're still in one piece?"

"Yup. Got shot a couple of times as well. But I'm still alive," the bot said smugly.

The younger man paled. "If I ever get to meet him, remind me not to get on his bad side."

"Don't get intimidated by his canons, human. He's a real soft spark if he wants to be," Sunny chuckled at the human's fear.

As much as Skyler didn't really believe that, he noticed that the screen also detected the same human in many of the pictures. "Say, have you noticed that there's a human that keeps showing near him?"

Sunstreaker focused his optics seeing at what Skyler was true, "Yes, I'm sure it's the same human in many of the pictures. Do you think you can ID that human?"

"I'll see what we can get from the database," the con man typed into the analyzer for human faces. "Got it! His name is Major William Lennox. According to the information he's in the army, nearly all his data is classified, except that he has a wife and daughter. The classified status pretty much explains that he holds a clearance to know your race. Information says he got his current rank thanks to the events in Mission City in 2007. Perhaps he's Ironhide's partner?"

"Most likely," Sunstreaker said. "Can we get to the next one?"

Skyler clicked on the next folder and started to open up multiple images again. This time however the next robot seemed to have a blue-red flame paint job and probably what made it unique was that its face had some sort of visor guard. Unlike the other muscular black Autobot he'd seen before, this one seemed more proportioned in terms of its body. However its height analysis made Skyler shrink into his chair. _Nearly 30 FEET?_ That was double Sunstreaker's height, heck, that height was as tall as a three story building!

_Somehow the young con man felt very, very, _   
_   
**tiny**   
_   
_. _

"How tall do your kind get?" Skyler asked abruptly his tone tense. "This guy is an Autobot?"

Sunny again laughed at the human as now he was starting to understand that humans were not used to have something larger than them around. "Very tall. But he's one of the tallest in the Autobots. He's Big Boss, our Commander, Optimus Prime."

"Commander, huh?" the young looked at the pictures in awe. He was staring at the leader of all the Autobots! It probably would be a wonder to meet the bot in real life. In a blink, Skyler then thought of something that was nagging inside his head, "Say, how do you differentiate between a Decepticon and an Autobot? Like you know, just by looking at them?"

"Easy. If a 'Con is in their bi-pedal mode, their optics are red. An Autobot's would be blue." Sunstreaker explained. "Alt-mode is a bit trickier, but we all have our faction sign somewhere on us."

He then used some sort of hologram through the one lights of the car to show to the human. The faction signs or at least to Skyler looked like logos were different. One he recognized seeing when he was cleaning Sunstreaker on his alt-form where the Lamborghini logo should be, the familiar square-shaped like face. The other seemed to be more sinister in a way, jagged, and very much screamed like that of a predator.

"I'll keep that in mind," Skyler nodded as he understood what the bot was telling him.

"Some Decepticons are larger than Optimus," Sunny added wanting to get another reaction from the human. "Megatron, leader of the Decepticons is one of them."

"Really?" the young man said in a small voice. But knowing something Sunstreaker did not, his voice came back. "Hey, Sunstreaker?"

Sunstreaker seeing the different change in attitude immediately responded, "Yes?"

"About that Aikido style, it's better to use against more… proportionate opponents. Twice or three times is ok. If the Decepticons are like four to five times bigger than you, I highly advise to use the evasive moves than to engage or accept the attack." Skyler clarified.

"That will be taken into account," Sunstreaker accepted the suggestion. "Next one, human."

The next one Sunstreaker identified as 'Ratchet', although Skyler noted by the tone of the warrior bot's voice that he didn't really like him in particular because he was the medic, and often nicknamed him 'Hatchet'. There was a muttering about how he had to see the CMO if his navigation and communication systems were to be fixed back at full function. The CMO Autobot was nearly large as Ironhide, his height maybe less than two feet short of the black one. Considering his neon colors with décor of red stripes it was noticeable that he was some sort of rescue or ambulance vehicle.

Afterward there was a bot that was uniquely and evidently from a motorcycle alt-form, but compared to the other bots it was smaller and curvier. The warrior Autobot had said it was a 'femme' (meaning 'female') and that her name was Arcee. There wasn't really much comment on her other than the fact she was on Earth. Within the same picture of her were two other small bots (slightly larger than Arcee), a set of twins. Sunstreaker's sour tone made it clear he didn't really like them too much, saying that they weren't really all that good and were only scouts. In some photos they were originally an ice cream truck, although it seemed as if they later on changed to bright neon green and maroon red Chevy concept cars.

"It seems like they were seen around the Princeton area," Skyler pointed to the only one picture that was captured roughly at the end of 2009, even if it was blurry. "Very peculiar."

"What's so significant about that?" Sunstreaker asked in dislike.

"You see, these videos we're watching now are from this guy's website. His name is Leo Spitz. I suppose he was like those alien watchers that tend to be crazy at times, but besides that, he closed off the site in 2009, after the events in Egypt and when they were hunting down a boy that was also at Mission City in the 2007 who was said to be scammed by a hacker where all over the word there was a mysterious recording." The con man showed what was the timeline events and the idea of the person he mentioned. Skyler was very much aware that the data he was holding now was from the CIA files, his Uncle Neil was one crazy person to get all of these and not get caught. He opened another file as well showing the file of the boy called Sam 'Witwicky', which was a very unusual name to remember.

Sunny perked at that, "Mysterious recording?"

"Yeah, many of the humans believed it was part of the scam. Even I thought it was part of a movie trailer or something," Skyler said lightly at first to soon realize what it really was. "Now come to think of it, I think it was what you guys called a Decepticon."

"Show me the recording," Sunstreaker pressed.

Skyler went into the database as he showed Sunstreaker the video. He was a bit worried when the Autobot was quiet for sometime.

"Frag it, looks like I missed a lot of battles." The disappointment tone was more like that of a person who missed watching the world championship finals live for some sport rather than truly regretful. "Well, human, that is a Decepticon, but considering your planet is still in one piece means that my side won that battle."

"True, but look here!" Skyler clicked open another file next to the previous ones, making a comparison, "There was one other photo in the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) files when they spotted Sam Witwicky in Egypt. In the picture you can see the two very same cars that you said are the scout twins and the one he was riding was a yellow car with racing stripes."

Looking at the new image of the twins and the yellow one, Sunstreaker couldn't help but notice how playful and full of energy it looked. It was Bumblebee! The youngest Autobot certainly looked well. And by the look of things Sunny figured out that maybe Bumblebee had guardianship over the Witwicky boy by the Prime's order.

"Where is the boy located now?" Sunstreaker inquired. "The yellow bot who's his car is Bumblebee, a close friend. If we can't find the military base, we can find him."

In a response to this, Skyler opened up a digital US map. "Well Princeton University is far from where we are, located further northeast in relation to where we are." He pinpointed a dot with an arrow 'you are here' with the other dots showing where Nevada was and where the University Princeton was. "I still say it's better to check the Nevada military base first, but it's a good alternative route."

"Are there any more findings of my kind?" Sunstreaker was feeling rather edgy as to why he had not seen his brother yet or other Autobots.

Skyler was silent for a while, guessing the Autobot was referring to his twin brother. "Give me some time on it. I think I'll do a check back on the failed samples."

"Why do that? They are failed results to the samples to a software analysis!"

Sunstreaker noticed how the human was frowning at first as if he was remembering something but looked content afterwards.

"Because I really believe that you can still find something if you keep looking," Skyler said in determination. "Every single detail counts. You're not supposed to give up until you check all of them consistently and carefully no matter how insignificant it is." A smile. "It was something my dad used to say."

The Autobot warrior was really perplexed and slightly awed on how such a small creature had all that resolve inside of it.

"Tell you what, how about you take the data from the external drives?" Skyler suggested. "They have useful info like Earth's languages, weapons and other things that you can look up while I'll do a manual check on the failed results."

"Acceptable," Sunstreaker said uncertainly, not knowing what else to say.

After Skyler had hooked him up to the ports of the external drives to a multi-port, he cracked his knuckles and set to work.

For what seemed to feel like an eternity, Skyler kept looking at picture after picture that the analysis considered as failures. The room was mostly silent other than the usual sound of the typing keyboard and the clicks from the mouse in Skyler's hand. This was a test for the young con man, if he couldn't fulfill his dad's words when it came to spotting every detail that there was in this task, then he wasn't fit enough to follow in Uncle Neil's expertise or even think about following Uncle Rusty's footsteps as the 'Detail Man.' He used every enhancement he could, every program that might help, and even went back to watching the original DVDs and used manual stop-motion from the remote control to spot anything else he could find.

About 5 hours later and after two cups of black coffee and a junk food delivery, Skyler was still typing and clicking away. He had refused to come out of the basement with his uncles when they offered to treat him to eat out. Sunstreaker had scanned the human's body and knew it was in need of a dire recharge. He was now aware that during the time he was unconscious on the road, the human had not recharged at all. The young con man was intent on doing as much as he could while he was in his 'determination' mode. Sunny decided to not push matters even though he was aware that the young one was being stubborn.

Skyler was in a near manically frustrated state because he knew he had missed something. He clicked his fingers from time to time setting his mind on a scene that he knew held something he'd missed. _I know I saw something, but where was it?_ It was there, he could feel it at the tips of his fingers that he was close, really close. In the past he always relied on Steve when it came to remembering things, as it was his twin's ability that made them compatible to one another when it came to planning things that Skyler would sometimes miss. Steve was not here and he knew he was on his own. This was a trial he had to pass. Checking and re-checking what seemed to be the 60th if not 70th time he watched a one particular video that day, his heart skipped a beat.

_Could it be?_

He jammed the mouse button on the pause button of the media so hard that he was certain he'd broken it, but thankfully it still worked.

It was one of the videos in the Shanghai Gas-Spill outbreak. While the video had shown it had a good view of Arcee, he noticed a different bot in the distance. Skyler brought his face nearer to the laptop screen while pinpointing the software to enhance and zoom to the maximum setting possible. The laptop was prompting him that it was going to take about 30 minutes with the highest ram he had installed into it to do the renders on the task, but Skyler didn't care. He hit the 'Enter' button to start the process.

With tense anticipation he sipped on his third drink, which was plain milk. He had decided to cut the caffeine if he was ever going to rest later on.

_Come on, come on. Don't let me down, lil' laptop. _

Finally completed, Skyler played the video on loop to so he could see it over and over.

His facial expression changed.

_From surprise…_

_To awe…_

_To the widest smile he had made in days. _

There it was, while Skyler was feeling sorry for the Decepticon that had been clearly been mutilated in half, the mech he had spotted out of the failed file of analysis had a particular air to it. Even if it looked as though it had a different alt-form and it was silver, the blades and the weapons it was using were very much the same he had seen on Sunstreaker. At the end, when the bot stood up from going for the kill, Skyler was more than convinced as the bot had wheels for its feet and its body features were identical to the twin that was right now with him.

Typing like mad like a lunatic to save the file and even made backups for it, Skyler stood up as he quickly connected the laptop to the video projector and turned it on with exhilaration. There was only one way to find out if the bot he had spotted was Sunstreaker's twin, and that was to let the bot see it for himself.

Sunstreaker seeing the human with a disturbed feeling wanted to know what the fuss was about. "What's going on human?" _The human was happy?_

"I found something!" Skyler smiled like he just won the grand prize of a lottery. "You HAVE to watch this, Sunstreaker!"

And with that he played the enhanced video recording.

Sunstreaker watched the mech with a great familiarity with his spark. He had no doubt he was seeing his long lost twin.

Sideswipe.

He couldn't help but shout, "It's Sides! It's REALLY him! You FOUND him!" He didn't care if he looked like a glitching bot at that moment as he repeated it over and over. There wasn't anything better in the universe than knowing that his twin was alive! The fact that the video was his brother slicing up the 'Con made Sunstreaker proud, for his movements were more perfect than he had seen him last time, back on Cybertron.

Skyler joined in the celebration with his laughter and smiled so wide that it was probably the best thing that had happened in ages. "Looks like your brother is having a good time killing that Decepticon."

"He's improved since the last time I saw him," Sunstreaker said with pride.

"Mmm-hm, he sure kicks ass," Skyler commented. "You want to go to where he is?"

"Later. He's safer where he is."

"But-"

"You found my twin brother, human," Sunstreaker cut in. "I _will_ help you find _yours_ first."

Skyler only nodded tiredly. "Thanks."

Sunstreaker scoffed. "I'm the one who should be thanking you."

The young man persisted, "Even so-"

"Thank you, Skyler."

Skyler was left there in silence that the robot was actually thanking him and using his name!

Sunny then said, "Go and recharge, human. You look like a wreck!"

"Can't lay off the thank you without an insult afterward, huh, Sunstreaker?" Skyler couldn't help but laugh.

Sunstreaker was now chuckling with the Skyler, "Consider it a miracle. I don't say any thanks to anyone other than Sides. Not even my leader."

"I'll take that as a high regard." Skyler gave a thumbs up. "I'll head up once I check a couple of other chunks of data."

"Do I need to shoot you so you can get your 'aft upstairs?" Sunny threateningly joked.

The young con man picked up a small unused white flag from one of the props in the garage and waved it at the bot in sign of giving up. "Fine, Sunstreaker. I'll head my way up straight away."

With everything finished for that day, Skyler turned off all the laptops and electronics he used in the garage and left his laptop in Sunstreaker's interior. He only left the electronics aside as the Autobot was pestering him to get his rest. Probably the cleaners would clean up his stuff in the morning. He packed up and headed up stairs.

Sunstreaker scanned and made sure that the young man headed towards his room to recharge. Satisfied that the human's breathing was steady and in a revitalization state, Sunstreaker went into his own, his spark at ease for the first time in a long time, knowing his brother was here on Earth.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 1.05: Sides Found!_

_Planet Earth, City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_Humans are such odd creatures, at one point they can be so untrustworthy and the next…the opposite. They probably would have a knack to fry Prowl's circuits if he was on Earth as they _   
_are_   
_ anything but logical. _

_How do they get that energy? _

_It was something that I really hadn't seen in a real long time. I suppose being confined for a long time by the mindless drones called 'Cons had made me think with regrets and everything. I probably have been alone for too long that I forgot what it was like to have another bot or person with you. I even had forgotten how it was with Sides as twins when the both of us were together because I closed off the bond. That connection of reassurance wasn't there anymore, only confusion, despair, and just wanting to survive was all there is. _

_My stay with the human Skyler was probably more than I bargained for. He had an energy that was infinite when he wanted to find something that was set into his mind, he just never gave up. In all those numerous failed files from the analysis he found my twin brother, Sideswipe. _

_He had found my twin!_

_Can you believe it? _

_He had found my lost twin, Sideswipe!_

_After all those eons of not knowing and being separated, my spark was at ease. Sides was with the other Autobots here on Earth hunting Decepticons with Big Boss and everyone else. I wasn't sure how many more Autobots were here, but knowing Sides was safe here was more than enough to put my previous worries finally to an end. _

_I know I'm not the typical bot to actually say a thank you or ask forgiveness so easily. Pit, I don't at all, and no one would ever receive one except for my twin. Not even Big Boss. Yet, what the human had done for me was something I had been so long, so desperately, trying to find with no results. He found Sides, of all bots, and I knew he was longing for his own twin as well._

_I made it clear to the human I was going help find his twin whatever it takes._

_He had done everything he could to find Sides. _

_I'll keep my promise to help Skyler find Steve. _

_A twin for a twin._

_~ Sunny_

_   
_

* * *

_   
_

 

**TBC…**


	6. 2nd Day of Tools and Techs, A Case of Disturbing and Fascinating Humans

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 6: 2nd Day of Tools and Techs, A Case of Disturbing and Fascinating Humans ~**

****

* * *

 

_Con man Log Entry 2.01: The Tools of Trade for a Con Man's survival_

_City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_Breakfast was good; I had tea instead of anything with large doses of caffeine in them. I may like Starbucks or any normal home coffee products, but it's not exactly healthy to drink like no tomorrow and end up with high-blood pressure and building up long term diseases. Yesterday's case was a special occasion, including the junk food. So this morning I settled in with more healthy and organic food._

_Sunstreaker would probably freak about me having the 'organic' food part._

_Most likely he still views anything organic as germs. Heh._

_Anyways… Uncle Neil for one had managed to blackmail Uncle Franz (blackmailing is common thing in a con man family) into spending the day with me talking about the tools I'd be bringing on my trip, without the excessive volume in his voice. I wasn't sure how he did it, but I think it had to do with that karate vs. aikido match we had yesterday. I wasn't going to complain about it (in fact, I'd thank God for it) as Uncle Franz was the best in what he did - that is, weaponry and explosives._

_Uncle Neil said he needed to go out to find out more about Steve, so it was probably a friend from his underground networks. He did however give that look to me that said I was somewhat in bad trouble. I wasn't sure of what it was, but there was a clear sign he was going to have 'the talk' with me after he got back. He left without anything else to say._

_I was sure at some point I'd probably need a gun in both Memphis and Kansas City, but at this point I'd already made my step into a war with the Autobots against the Decepticons, and it made me think that I needed more firepower. Well, I wasn't Rocky, Rambo, or the Terminator, and I wasn't the type to go in with guns blazing. I guess I prefer being more discreet if I can. Simply put, my size was already a hazard against gigantic mechs if I wanted to play with strength, which meant the only option I had was to play by strategy, skills, plus pray to any higher deity out there to have TONS of damn luck._

_Why luck?_

_Because there's NO such thing as a foolproof plan and…_

_Simply put, it's the only thing that's effective against Murphy's Law which causes foolproof plans to turn into any con man's worst nightmare._

_No questions asked._

_So, my agenda today was doing the 'survivor items checklist' including weapons and con man survival rations. But before that, I think I'll ask Sunstreaker about the Decepticons._

_The first rule that is important to a con man:_

"_Know thy Enemy."_

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

The Autobot wasn't hard to find as Skyler had guessed. Sunstreaker was very good in not giving up the act as a normal car.

_Except the part where he would give a small shock to people who were too curious for their own good._

For that reason, Skyler was tolerant about it. Apparently one of the cleaners this morning who had attempted to touch the Autobot had gotten a surprise. Good thing he had the Alt-form of an elite car, the one who saw what happened had thought it was probably the next generation of car security. The young con man noted that he would have that talk with the Autobot later. For now he had to ask about the Decepticons.

When he got to the garage, Sunstreaker was in a much lighter mood. He wasn't grumbling as much, although there was a minor complaint about the cleaners being covered with dirt but it wasn't really a problem. Skyler soon launched into asking about the Decepticons, their leader, Megatron, second in command Starscream, and a few other Decepticons that Sunstreaker had encounters with. The only problem he had was the fact that he didn't know who was on Earth minus the one he'd fought with when he landed on Earth by the designation of Dreadnought.

Sunstreaker wasn't exactly happy about the fact that he (the D'Con of course) somehow ran away from the battle, leaving him in a heap of muck and dirt. Supposedly from the Autobot's description, Dreadnought was roughly larger than Sunstreaker but slower and more armored which made it rather difficult to take him down even with numerous hits from the Autobot's blades and cannons. If this Decepticon was about and probably still around looking for Sunstreaker, that meant that Skyler was also a target.

"Is there a way that he might have reinforcements?" Skyler asked, wanting to know every single detail of the enemy.

Sunstreaker was resolute about it. "No. The battle itself took out both our communication and navigation systems out. But the fact that he is a tracker is a problem, human. Stay here or in any one place for too long, and you can consider yourself being fragged by the 'Con."

_That wasn't good._

Ok, the fact that the enemy couldn't call for back-up was good. But a tracker or a hound type? That certainly put the stakes up by a notch. Skyler was aware he'd have everything done by today with the weapons, tools, IDs and money. Tomorrow was focusing on the plans of heading towards Kansas City and pretty much investigating where and what Steve had disappeared to. It was probably best that they leave on the fourth day. Having a Decepticon on their backs was more than enough to invite danger to his uncles and he did not want them to be dragged into this mess as well.

"Well, it seems the best plan is to engage the enemy and take him down," Skyler concluded in thinking mode. "Tricky part is the how. Hmm, does he have any known particular weaknesses? Disloyalty, phobia, physical weaknesses, or any other things?"

Sunstreaker mocked the human. "Is it that hard just to bait him in and kill him? He is a tracker but he isn't exactly the bot that is smart in battle. Pit, he's considered a coward, the reason why he's still around is that his loyalty is only to Megatron. Anyone beneath that he doesn't listen to."

"True, he may have a lot of weaknesses there and he's alone," the young man agreed. "But from your description he's difficult to take down and he will run for it if he feels he would get offlined. I wouldn't be surprised if he runs off again."

"What are you trying to do, human?" Sunstreaker questioned. "You're up to something."

Skyler nodded, "I was thinking about how to take his legs out or wheels. If that happens, he can't run and it's a go in for the kill. But the difficult part is getting rid of the remains. There has to be a way of getting rid of the evidence, or humans will swamp in to see the 'alien body' and it'll on the news and everything. Attracting attention? Not good. You might get more Decepticons that do have their communication and navigation systems fully online hunting us down."

The Autobot grunted, "You make things so complicated, human. If you're worried about remains and engaging him in a secluded place your, then the best option would be what you humans call a 'car' junkyard."

"A good idea," Skyler noted. "The only thing now is to take him down. Do mechs have weaknesses in terms of anatomy? You know, body wise?"

Sunny didn't need a moment to think on that one, "Easiest way to kill a mech is to offline the spark. But his slaggin' armor is too thick unless it's torn down numerous times. Unless…"

"Unless what?" the con man asked on the bot's uncertainty. "Sunstreaker?"

This was the part where Sunstreaker was hesitant. While he did promise the human he was going to help find his twin, requesting the human to be a battle partner was something he found difficult. He had never fought with someone else other than with Sides. Having to fight with a human was more of a distraction for him than fighting with an Autobot. Organics were very frail and easy stepped on or crushed by mechs and Skyler was pretty much the same like other humans. Getting the human in harm's way was merely another obstacle he had to deal with. However, he very much knew that Dreadnought was not going down without a good fight and the fact the Decepticon would run away again did not appeal to Sunny. Having a D'Con on his tail wasn't really a wise choice either.

"Sunstreaker?" the young man repeated himself.

Snapping back to reality, Sunstreaker composed himself. "I do have something in my processor, but it would require your assistance."

Skyler raised an eyebrow at that. _Is he asking for help?_ He was a little puny human that can be easily squished by these bots without them even trying, how was he going to help?

In a serious tone the bot asked, "How good are you as a sniper?"

* * *

Watching.

Waiting.

Ever patiently.

For his prey.

His form was probably not the best suited to camouflage within the fleshling community, but he was just as agile and sly to keep out of sight.

Wings folded, hidden on top of the building, the hideous sharp metallic Horus falcon-like being watched with intense optics.

Red optics gazed at the building below of what the fleshlings had said it to be an abandoned storage area of steel and other metal materials in an industrial area of the city. Of course, the Decepticon knew that there were many humans inside it. One in particular was his target, but so far the one he was looking for had not shown its true abilities yet. He'd wait for all eternity if he had to.

He didn't want to fail his master.

Not after Frenzy and Ravage were offlined by those blasted Autobots and their fleshling allies.

It was him and Rumble left.

:: Soundwave to Laserbeak. ::

:: Laserbeak responding. :: the spy answered while still keeping himself hidden and watching the building below.

An emotionless voice came from the comm. :: Have you located the targets? ::

:: Affirmative. There are 15 possible candidates for one of the fleshling hackers responsible for the breach block. Numerous tests done by the fleshling organization who abducted the 15 have not proved any of them as the original target yet. ::

:: Autobot activity in the area detected? ::

:: Negative. :: Laserbeak said sending a feeling affirmation to his master through their odd bond. :: Will notify if they are in radar. ::

There was a silence over the comm. but it was a sign that the Decepticon Intel Officer was formulating a plan in his head. :: Inform the best candidates that matches the fleshling hackers up-to-date. ::

:: Four of the 15 are the best qualified. Fleshling designations, Darren Richards, Freddy Derrick, Natalie Lee, and Steve Knight. ::

:: Keep your audio visuals online all times. You are to acquire whichever is the _real_ fleshling hacker _alive._ Megatron's orders. :: the voice was ever so cold.

Laserbeak knowing that actually meant failure wasn't an option tensed and his programming for calculations sped up. :: Consider it done. ::

:: This mission must be done with utmost discretion, Laserbeak. ::

:: Yes, Soundwave. Laserbeak out. ::

:: Soundwave out. ::

* * *

'_**BANG!'**_

'_**BANG!'**_

'_**BANG!'**_

A bullet shell hit the floor with a 'clink' as Skyler assessed his count with a sigh.

120 shots, 90 hits, and only 50 of them hit dead on the bull's-eye.

_Oh, God! I'm rusty! THIS SUCKS!_

"Another 10 shots, Sky!" Franz shouted at his nephew.

He was only answered with a hand wave indicating a 'yes'.

In the first basement ground was a weapons and explosives testing area filled with various cupboards and cases of many things that probably had enough gear to equip a small army squad.

While his nephew was busy with shooting, Franz looked just beside him to where the Lamborghini was parked. He warily looked at it as the older man always had a feeling it was watching him. Why the boy drove it from the parking space from the 2nd basement below was beyond the elder man's reasoning. Of course the 1st part of the basement did have space to park a truck to haul in equipment, but a Lambo? _Looks like the boy has some obsession with the car._ The American-African man knew that somehow the boy had stolen it (as it wasn't really affordable to someone who only had a job as a paint job guy), but was not intent on asking how. Even so, there was something in him that made the older man proud that the kid that he'd dangled around his knees years ago was a soon to be qualified con man.

'_**BANG!'**_

Another dead on hit to the bull's-eye.

_And one hell of a lethal sniper._

_Taylor really has a frightening kid._

Franz's mind wondered back to the memories to his deceased friend as they both once served as freelance weapon makers for the US Army in the past. That witty detail man and never-ending burst of energy that made Taylor his friend was now seen inside of his son. Although there were clear indications that Skyler was more like his mother when it came being down-to-earth. His father wasn't as modest; one big headed prick was more like it. _Thank the Lord none of his children actually inherited that part of him._ But perhaps the death of his friend was the reason why the elder twin had somewhat lost the most cheerful side of him.

Another two shots ended up with a mark on the target but missed the bull's-eye.

The weapons and explosives expert knew that his other nephew Steve was missing and it somewhat worried him so. However his fixer accomplice, Neil, said he had found news of where he was in Kansas City. The worrying part was that the fixer wasn't telling him or Skyler for that matter what he found out yet. For all Franz knew, it was a serious issue. He knew that his nephew wasn't the type of person, who would kill a person so freely. So he only concluded that he needed the sniper training for more sabotage uses.

Skyler's request of explosives, flares, and a few other infiltration equipment he could understand, but the odd request for things that can get through tank armor or a few specifics that would destroy thick layers of wiring was somewhat nagging on Franz's mind. He didn't have anything in his disposal about an explosive that was small enough for concealment to go through tank armor but he did prepare something that would help his nephew.

With the last bang ended with a shell rolling on the floor, Franz concluded the results.

"130 rounds, 100 hits, 55 bull's-eyes. Nice work, Skyler."

There was a skeptical frown on the boy's face, "Thanks for the compliment, but that was the worst record I got."

"There is a reason why I gave you that World War II Soviet issued Mosin-Nagant rifle, to use." Franz said lightly.

"Crawl before you walk?" Skyler suggested what his uncle was thinking of.

A nod. "That's right, boy. I needed to see how you were faring first. You need to get used to the 'feel' of that rifle in your hands again."

"I 'feel' like my hands could come off," the boy commented as he exercised his hands opening and closing them. "Feels awful."

"Don't worry, Sky. If you get used to the recoil on the older types, the newer types are more of a breeze," the weapons specialist reminded.

Skyler sighed. "Still need a lot of work."

"Well, if you think so, son, fire another 30 rounds so we can get the count to 150 for today," Franz said. "Neil should be coming in soon to tell us about Steve. You do that while I get you something that you requested that should suit your needs. Again, like before, shoot twice, then relocate. RINSE AND REPEAT, BOY!"

Still having his hands on his ears, the young con man smiled as he reminded his uncle, "Didn't you promise Uncle Neil that you'd _not_ use excessive volume?"

Franz snapped his mouth shut, cursing himself as he had just provided more blackmail material for his nephew to use on him.

_Why did the boy have to inherit his father's talent for blackmailing?_

_God just wasn't fair to stop that at one generation for some deluded reason._

_Skyler: 1, Franz: 0_

The African-American man quickly exited the room before he created more blackmail material on himself.

Seeing the annoying loud fleshling leave, Sunstreaker commented, "Noisy as usual, but he's a lot more informative today."

Skyler looked to the Lamborghini with interest, "He useful when you give him a good blackmailing or a dose of a challenging heist which makes his brain work better. He's a lot more trigger happy than his brother Uncle Basher. Uncle Basher is an explosives expert but he tends to be, how can I say it? …Poetic."

Sunny perked at that, "You know, you humans may be as crazy as the craziest Cybertronians. A 'poetic' explosives expert? Didn't see that one coming."

"Just how crazy can a Cybertronian get when it comes to explosives?" the young man questioned.

"You need to know?"

A shrug. "Just asking."

Sunstreaker chuckled, "Ironhide is a trigger happy weapons specialist, but he's a defined warrior, in our faction the winner is pretty much Wheeljack."

"Wheeljack?" Skyler asked and then hinted, "Explosives expert?"

"No, a scientist."

Skyler smiled while he was holding a snigger, "Don't tell me, he blows things up as part of his experiments?"

"Spot on, human," Sunny joked. "If he was here most of his failed attempts would be nearly impossible to cover by your health insurance."

The younger man laughed, "Come on. What? And he's just allowed to fiddle with explosives? Anybody knows that you give explosions to test to an explosives expert, not a scientist. Scientists are made to think and carry out testing theories by using samples. Not very applicative."

"Like you humans say, 'beggars can't be choosers'," Sunny said with a sigh. "He's the only one available, since there are not a lot of us left. The others prefer to stay as far away from his lab as possible though, rather than get blown to pieces to be reassembled again by the medic."

"I see what you mean," Skyler said in agreement that meant humans would just end up as a splat. He then changed the subject, "So, how did I do for three years without sniper training?"

Sunstreaker checked back on Skyler's shooting through his memories. "Good enough. But not enough to actually use it in a Decepticon fight."

"I was afraid of that," the con man said with irritation. "I don't have problems with _field craft, _reload, or relocating, but I need to work on my accuracy. What-"

"Human, you don't have problems with your accuracy or calculations. It's fine," Sunny interjected. "You're mistranslating the 'feel' your uncle said."

"So it isn't a 'feel' of it in your hands… It's the feel of the mind," Skyler clicked his fingers in realization.

Sunstreaker agreed, "That's right. You're not thinking right yet."

"Thinking right in terms of?"

The Autobot grunted, "Alright, human. Lift that rifle of yours and take aim."

Skyler blinked at first, but did what he was told.

"I'll make it easier for you, human. Think that you're a con man that is already on the day of your heist," Sunstreaker directed. "Relax your shoulders; don't be so stiff, and focus on your mark, you're going to blow your cover if you don't."

The young man did so.

Seeing the human in a better position, Sunstreaker added in more details, "Be precise, be blunt, to the point, do your job, don't hesitate. Either you shoot or you don't. Shoot once and relocate, the 'Con will try to scan the area, and if he locks on to you, you're organic splat. Now, go!"

As if hypnotized, Skyler let go of his main thoughts as he focused on his task. Bullet after bullet, relocating, reloading, and shooting at the targets in front of him in succession. It went on and on, until the last bullet shell fell to the floor. After everything was done, he assessed his work.

Skyler couldn't help but gape at what he had done.

"30 rounds, 30 hits, and 27 hits on the bull's-eye. Much better, human," Sunstreaker complimented.

Still blinking and not believing what he did he asked, "But how? It's even better than I did three years ago!"

Sunny laughed smugly, "Three years ago you probably didn't have as much experience as you do now. The problem you have is only adapting the way you think."

"Define the way I think," Skyler said requesting for an explanation.

The answer was short, "You're thinking too much."

Surprised, Skyler nearly dropped the rifle to the floor, "WHAT? That's it?"

Sunstreaker wanted to roll his optics, "You're used to thinking long term, human. Switch it to short term when you snipe. Snap, quick, precise decisions and you live. Don't do that, you're offlined."

Skyler smiled, "Thanks for the tip. You make a good trainer for an Autobot."

Sunstreaker laughed at that, "That's just the basics, human. It's nothing compared to what real Cybertronian snipers are."

"So, do the Autobots have a sniper?" the young man asked.

"Yes. His designation is Mirage. Like his name, he can cloak himself to camouflage with his surroundings, shoot, and disappear without notice." Sunstreaker responded. "I haven't seen him in ages though."

Skyler was rather jealous of that ability, as it probably cut his field craft to blend in with the surroundings by a mile. Just as he was about to tell the Autobot something, his uncle came down the steps, back from whatever he was getting. He was carrying a few boxes that were stacked together, which Skyler immediately went over to lighten up his uncle's load, followed the elder one to set up the field again.

"Damn it BOY, 30 hits with 27 BULL'S-EYES?" he exclaimed, looking at the scoreboard with wide eyes.

"Mouth," Skyler warned but he still smiled.

_Skyler: 2, Franz: 0_

Franz did a double-take. "You're one scary kid, Skyler. I feel sorry for the guys you're taking down. How did you manage that?"

Still smiling, he replied to his uncle, "I remember something that a good friend told me sometime ago on how to shoot."

Sunstreaker couldn't help a fond feeling towards the human for saying it, but stayed silent as a car should be.

"Ok, Skyler. I've just got the right stuff for you and your sabotage mission or whatever it is you're going to do."

The Autobot watched silently as the elder man took out carrying case. Skyler for one was beyond happy when he saw it. At first Sunstreaker didn't know why, but once the elder man opened it inside was a M110 SASS (also known M110 Semi-Automatic Sniper System).

"This lil baby, is the most up-to-date semi-automatic rifle issued by the US Army for snipers and designated marksmen," Franz took the main rifle out. "A real beauty, issued in 2008 for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, effective range of 800-1000 m. Now since you're not going to go around and kill people, you're going to use these special cartridges based on the 7.62x51mm NATO cartridges. They're custom made, and not on the market. Now, Sky, see any differences between these and the real ones?"

Skyler looked as he picked two similar shapes but each was coded differently. "First one is similar to a to a latching dart bullet, supposedly when it's fired it latches open and hits the target. Not sure what the second one does, but it sort of looks like something for a flash grenade than an actual sharp cartridge bullet."

"Correct on both counts. The second one is meant for distraction fire, best used after the initial round for attack. Let's try bullet number 1 on how it works elegantly with the M110 SASS. Safety glasses and earplugs on!" Franz said as he loaded the gun and aimed it at a target that was what seemed to be a tangle of wires as thick as a large diameter tree.

A shot was fired, and the small missile plunged into the wires and latched on. A couple of seconds and then…

**'**_**BOOM!'**_

The result ended up with the wires completely burnt and torn. In some parts the plastics of the wires were melting.

Skyler couldn't help but laugh, "That was awesome! You got to teach me how to make that!"

"Eventually I will, but remember, family secret," his uncle waved a finger at him.

"I'll take it to the grave!" Skyler said with enthusiasm. From what he was looking at, perhaps it was the best bet of getting around the Decepticon Dreadnought.

"I still have spares, but eventually they'll run out if you use them often."

"How many spares you got?" the young con man questioned.

A pause. "About 30 cartridges, how much you need, son?"

"How about everything you got?" Skyler asked. "It's for Steve."

Franz frowned clearly not going to agree.

Skyler shrugged his shoulders, "Oh, well, I'm sure Uncle Neil would be happy to hear you got 2 outbursts in one day-"

"Hold it!" Franz stopped his nephew. "Not a word, boy. You win. I'll get the whole stock." The man ran up the stairs.

_Skyler: 3, Franz: 0_

This round Skyler was clearly the winner.

"So, what do you think about bullet number 1, Sunstreaker?" Skyler asked his Autobot friend.

There was satisfaction in the bot's voice, "Very impressive. If you shoot the 'Con in his sensitive wiring on the legs or near the knee-caps it should leave the bugger rolling on the floor or leaking out energon. Its small size makes it an effective missile and sniping is better than getting you involved with a direct fight, human. I can't wait to get my hands on Dreadnought."

Skyler smirked, "We're just getting started, Sunstreaker. We haven't got to the normal handgun or my personal favorite, the explosives."

"Making your poor uncle being the 'mark' again, human?" Sunstreaker commented on the blackmailing.

"Yup," Skyler grinned devilishly.

Feeling there was a need for more blackmail entertainment, Sunny only said, "Do it again."

The young con man smiled wider.

"You bet."

* * *

The world went like a blur to him.

After what seem to be the longest hours of his life just resting on the med bay berth, he was finally cleared by Ratchet to be back on duty. The Chevrolet Stingray concept sped like a bullet on the road, effortlessly maneuvering through that day's usual traffic and very soon reaching the interstate roads for the journey heading eastwards. He had a mission to fulfill and he was rather desperate to get away from his original thoughts on his missing twin. Try as he might, but the fact he was running away from it, that feeling was making him feel worse.

:: Optimus to Sideswipe::

Sideswipe ignored the first transmission, didn't he just leave base an hour ago?

:: Sideswipe, please respond. :: The tone was now sterner.

Sighing, as he knew it was better not to disregard his leader to the end of his patience, he replied, :: Sideswipe to Big Boss, responding. Hear ya loud and clear. ::

:: What is your location? ::

The silver warrior bot wanted to roll his optics. For some reason he had a feeling it had something to do with the medic. :: On route to Princeton University. Just exited out of Nevada. ::

:: How is your status? :: the commander asked.

:: Isn't that Hatchet's job to ask me? :: Sideswipe said in an annoyed tone. :: I've only left the base less than 2 hours ago and he's already asking over and over? Scrap, I'll never hear the end of it. ::

Optimus Prime sighed as he knew Sideswipe was one of the more difficult warrior subordinates he usually dealt with. :: Sideswipe, he only wished to check on how you are doing. ::

Not really wanting to hear anything else from the medic brought a snappy reply from the younger bot. :: I'm fine, Big Boss, just tell Hatchet I won't be if he keeps on sending message transmissions that are loud enough to fry my audio receptors. I don't care if I ever return to the med bay even if he'll weld me to the berth for it. ::

While the Autobot leader was very well aware that Sideswipe was not well after knowing that upon Hound and Mirage's arrival there was no news of Sunstreaker, it was not wise to push that matter. His medic was not at all agreeable with the idea that there was a sudden change of plans for the younger warrior's mission out of the rest of them; Sideswipe was free from any base duties. But to Optimus Prime, perhaps a real mission, rather than helping with the guarding of Sam and Leo, would distract Sideswipe's thoughts from his brother.

:: Just how many transmissions has Ratchet sent you? :: Optimus asked patiently.

A snort went over the comm. :: Does seventy-five transmissions over a less than two hour period sound paranoid enough for a medic? ::

:: I will have a word with Ratchet later. :: the Prime said.

Sideswipe was actually happy that the medic would get a lecture from the Prime for that. Too bad he wasn't at the base to celebrate it.

:: Which roads are you using to travel to your destination? ::

:: Heading east until I hit the coast. I'll use the coastal roads to head north. :: Sideswipe replied.

Seeing as the warrior bot was near, Optimus immediately sent an order. :: Change of plans, Sideswipe. Your mission guarding the boy will be postponed for now. Slow down, I have another mission for you. ::

:: What? :: Sides asked in surprise while on the road as he drastically decreased his constant speed. He wasn't really looking forward to the last mission because 'Bee and the minor twins already covered it. But he wasn't really expecting to go on a spontaneous mission just as he got out of the base. :: What's this all about? ::

:: The human intelligence team has detected some sort of hackers' activity that is similar to the breach two months ago, located in Kansas City. Recon the area and report back to me if you find anything. :: the Prime said. :: Be aware that there may be Decepticons in the area who could have detected the activity as well. ::

:: On it, Big Boss. :: Sideswipe's tone was happier. :: A recon mission while checking anything beats a babysitting mission. ::

Knowing that the warrior had a tendency to do things a bit overboard with his missions, Optimus made sure he had the younger bot's word.

:: Sideswipe, this is a recon mission. Ironhide and I will expect you to find and report any information on the hackers and Decepticons in the area, _and __not through a body count!_ :: the Prime reminded. It was a good thing that the elder twin wasn't around to add to it. Sunstreaker was harder to reprimand than his brother about bloodlust.

Sheepishly Sides responded, :: You know your soldiers better than anyone, Big Boss. But can't I just offline one Con if the glitch was- ::

:: Sideswipe. ::

:: It's only one Con- ::

:: Sideswipe. ::

:: Can't I at least- ::

:: _Sideswipe._ :: this time the tone was not going to give the other any chances.

Sensing that he really didn't have a say in it, Sides sighed as he gave up. :: Fine. Alright. Ok. It's_ only_ a recon mission. You're no fun, Boss. ::

The Prime ignored the last comment and went by as usual. :: Very well, report to me when you arrive. I will notify you if there's any more information from NEST.::

:: Yes sir. Sideswipe out. ::

:: Optimus Prime out. ::

Sides huffed from his vents. Just when he got a real good mission, he had orders not to engage any 'Cons unless they attacked first. That sucked real badly, after the whole event in Egypt the Decepticons had been mostly quiet and the only thing huge that happened was the sudden breach in the Intel security. Still many things were in fact unbelievable to both the Autobots' and Sideswipe's processor which was that those who had managed to block the breach were two human hackers.

The silver warrior bot was no real genius when it came to codes and programming but a feat that could actually confuse the Intel officer of the Decepticons and even Prowl who was the top guy when it came to logic, really overturned the rest of the bots. Perhaps the nature of humans being so unpredictable only added to the factors of why that happened. Even though the humans plus Prowl were looking for them without much of a lead till now was surprising. It shouldn't have taken over a week to find them and the mission he was on was simply a lead that could very well be just some rumor.

_Oh, well. At least it beats babysitting the human Prime and his friend Leo._

Much of Sideswipe's thoughts were now on how 'Bee was so close to his human companion. Well, he was the boy's guardian from the start, but Sideswipe had never really thought of having a human to protect or the like unless he must. Then there was Ironhide and Major Lennox sharing a friendship; the weapon's specialist even went to great lengths to protect his family as well. The recently revived Jazz was now with Sergeant Epps' family even though he was not yet on duty. As for the minor twins Skids and Mudflap, they both got Leo although Sides was very certain that at many points the boy was in need of them because of the Decepticons; not that he really relied on them for anything else.

Sideswipe was an easygoing bot when it came to knowing others, but he always ended up stopping to wonder what his brother would think of it. He just couldn't really imagine his own twin approving of him getting a 'pet' as the elder would call it unless it was an order from the Prime. Maybe it was a good idea that he didn't have a human partner for now, he already had duties and so forth. There was no time for relaxing.

He had a mission to do.

Even if it was only a temporary respite from his main task, he was glad for it.

A little detour wouldn't hurt.

_Kansas City it is._

Shifting to his full out speed once again, Sideswipe burst down the road with a blinding velocity.

* * *

_At Night…_

After what seemed to be a whole day of endless blackmail in the house, things were going in a generally good direction for the gear that Skyler was going to bring with him. Happily, Skyler tucked the M110 SASS in a special duffel bag for easy carrying, along with other explosive goods. He had gotten a normal semi-automatic 9mm handgun for 'human' defensive purposes. With all the things that he was carrying with him, it felt like he was going to do a Resident Evil game.

_Only this was real life, and instead of mindless zombies he was going against massive robotic organisms._

'_Story of my life?'_

_Maybe he could figure out a better quote than Leon S. Kennedy._

Maybe his situation was closer to Resident Evil 5.

As soon as Uncle Neil had come home, though, there was a sudden tense atmosphere. Apparently, Steve was last seen going to some sort of hacker expo function and was invited to be one of the hackers to test out some firewall system. But apparently all who attended had never returned or came home. The police for one were trying to track down the group who hosted the event as 15 people were reported to be invited. Some came from formal backgrounds from prestigious colleges, there was a young hacker at the age of 16 with them as well, and last but not least there was Steve and his friend, Natalie.

It was an odd organization of some sort that was interested in the hacker breach-block of a mysterious nameless government military subdivision. This time Skyler was pounded by his 'fixer' uncle on what really happened. Fearing for the safety of his twin, he gave in.

In the end Skyler confessed that Steve and he were the ones behind defending the breach into the mysterious organization. He took the user name as _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_ and Steve was_RecordatioFurtaCorona2_. They both had instantly realized that it wasn't a normal breach they had seen by normal hackers, nor did it have any usual characteristics of hacking done by other countries, thus they took action in defending the government instead. They were both thieves, or con men but it didn't mean they weren't patriotic at all. At the end of the day, both twins agreed to never hack in that specific style that they developed for that breach.

The whole fiasco was enough to make both of his uncles have their jaws on the floor. Well, who wouldn't when their nephews counter-hacked someone and still escaped without the government tracking them down? While they were proud in the sense that they had both proved themselves to the world, Skyler still got a lecture from both of them. The young man accepted it without complaint, it was his fault they were both in trouble, and simply it was his responsibility to get his younger brother out.

There were rumors amongst the underground marketers that the 15 people were held in the industrial part of town. Uncle Neil was currently working on the exact place. Both his uncles then had packed up for the night, and it was Skyler and Sunstreaker in the garage yet again on the 2nd night of their stay.

While there was no indication of a true name of what military subdivision Steve and Skyler protected, there was a logo that came with Uncle Neil's findings. It was something that one would expect from some Texas logo of what it seemed to be a large ox-skull, the logo was black and white, and in bold letters it said 'NEST'. Surely it was an abbreviation of something, but what?

Skyler was back on his laptop trying to find anything that may be related to NEST, only to find nothing. His uncle was a great 'fixer', and him not finding an abbreviation of it must mean it was highly guarded by the government.

"Human, have you found anything on that logo?" Sunstreaker asked.

The con man breathed out. "No. Nothing, but I felt like I'd seen it before when Uncle Neil gave it to me. I can't remember where."

"I think I've seen it as well," Sunstreaker agreed.

Skyler looked at the Autobot, "Do you remember where exactly?"

"You remember that human you ID-ed with Ironhide? I think there was the same triangle on the side of his arm limb or something," Sunny pointed out.

Frantically, Skyler searched for the file on his computer for the photo of the soldier and when he found it he zoomed in with photo enhancement.

The results were shocking.

It was the _same _logo.

"All along Steve and I were protecting your kind's military division without knowing," Skyler gasped. "Talk about the 'threads of fate'."

Seeing it as well Sunstreaker was now more curious and even more suspicious about the hacker who wanted the Autobots' information in a human organization. He was very sure no reasonable human would actually find the server of a Cybertronian unless they were lead to it. From the humans' conversations they had in the garage, Sunstreaker listened in on how Skyler and his twin, Steve only followed the weird data burst signal through the hacker's encoding as whoever it was breached into NEST.

"Do you still have a recording or some sort when you blocked the hacker?" Sunstreaker asked abruptly.

"I do."

"Can you give it to me? I think I can analyze it," the Autobot said in a tense tone.

Quickly, Skyler managed to get a recording from one of Uncle Neil's external drives and gave it to Sunny.

Sunstreaker scanned the file itself and was thrown so far overboard with the findings that he scanned it numerous times, trying to make sure his programs were working correctly. Knowing that the human was waiting for him, he knew he had to tell the young man the truth.

Disturbed Sunny asked, "You really wish to know the results, human?"

"What is it, Sunstreaker?" Skyler sighed. "You know I'll have to know it sooner or later. Sooner the better."

There was a hesitant pause at first. "This encryption is definitely Cybertronian. More specifically it's a Decepticon's," Sunny said sternly. "Would you happen to know who it might be? Or did the user use a specific name?"

Skyler was so stunned to hear that he'd blocked a robotic alien that he couldn't say anything.

Not hearing a sound Sunstreaker asked again, "Human?"

Silence.

"Skyler, did the 'Con leave a name at all or not?" Sunstreaker pressed.

Snapping out of the daze Skyler scratched his head, "Well, he/she did. It was an odd one though. The user name was SonitusUnda."

"What the frag does that mean?" the Autobot asked. "There's no Con with that name or any translation of your language to it."

"Huh?" A confused look was on Skyler's face. "It's Latin."

Sunstreaker checked the data Skyler gave him, "It seems that that language isn't in the modern language database you gave me."

Embarrassed, Skyler apologized quickly, "Sorry about that, Latin is an ancient language, but it's commonly used for scientific terms and biological terms. I'll get you the data for ancient languages later."

"What does SonitusUnda, mean?" Sunstreaker asked again. "Or is it just gibberish, as you humans say?"

"It isn't gibberish," Skyler shook his head as he explained. "It's two combined Latin words of 'Sonitus' and 'Unda', it translates as something odd, considering that there's no official term for it in the ancient language as technology wasn't as advanced a long time ago when Latin was a used language."

"Best translation on the two words?"

Skyler's eyes drifted as he tried to remember, "Alright. The closest thing to ' Unda ' means 'wave' as in ocean or water waves or ripple according to its Latin translation. As for ' Sonitus' it means sound. So if you combine them it's sound and wave together. Sound wave is the best translation if you add the in tech aspects of today."

"SOUNDWAVE?" Sunny shouted with such dread that it shocked the poor human to the ground.

Sunstreaker was now more than in a position to fry his processor circuits. The very same human that he kidnapped and had actually helped him find Sides, had gone against Soundwave in a hacker battle with his twin…and _won._ _This is GLITCHING insane!_ From what seemed like a simple mission that was only to find the human's twin, now with the Decepticon in it…life was a lot more complicated. He couldn't deny that this human that was in front of him had managed the feat when it was clear that hardcore evidence was there on the human's database.

Things clearly weren't looking up as the Autobot was worried that if Soundwave knew he was alive there was a chance that he'd go after Sideswipe since his bond tampering had been unsuccessful in offlining them both. He would just have to endure until there were more things known about it. For now, he was still a living bomb to his brother and always made sure the bond was closed off.

Falling flat out on his butt, Skyler recovered and managed to gain a bit of courage to ask in a small voice. "You know him?"

"DO I know HIM?" Venom coming from the bot's voice. "Of course! Every Autobot would know the mindless drone's 'aft! How the Pit did you go against him and still come out alive, human?"

Annoyed that he wasn't really seeing the big picture, the con man replied, "It was only a hacker battle, I erased any traces with Steve by using a self-created random relocating data burst that interferes with IP geo-locating programs or software. What's the big deal about this guy?"

"Human, he's the Decepticon's Intelligence Officer!" Sunstreaker yelled. "Not to mention he's one of Megatron's higher ranking and most loyal followers."

_At that moment, Skyler felt like someone took his heart, pulled it out from his body, and it was rolling on the floor._

_SHIT!_

Waves of fear washed through the young con man and goose bumps emerged from his skin. A notion struck through him like lightning.

"Wait- If Soundwave is intent on hunting us down then could he possibly-" he stopped in mid sentence with anxiety. "Would he go after Steve?"

Not really liking where this was going Sunstreaker gravely said, "With the information your uncle picked up, it's most likely."

"Shit. F*** it," Skyler said in frustration as he rubbed his face letting it all out.

_Oh yes, Sky, you really nailed the target this time!_

_Out of all things you could have done; you declared a hacker war on a DECEPTICON!_

_Not to mention it was the INTEL OFFICER._

Sighing in aggravation, Skyler could only conclude on one thing.

_Murphy's Law just loves me._

Whether he liked it or not, the situation had just gotten worse than ever.

"One alternative is probably to join up with your twin after we get Steve, Sunstreaker," Skyler said to the Autobot. "But somehow it's not really going to be pretty, thieves/con men don't match with military guys. I'd be safe from the Decepticons, but I'll still have trouble with the government. From your description of Soundwave…do you have some sort of grudge?"

There was an evident growl coming from Sunstreaker, "Of course I do, human! He's the reason why I'm separated from my twin! The stupid rusty fragger tampered my bond with Sideswipe." There was anxiety in the bot's voice. "If he finds out I'm alive or knows I'm alive, Soundwave will hunt my twin down."

"Why?" Skyler asked. "Why is he hunting the both of you down?"

Sunstreaker was silent at first, but chose to tell his human companion anyway, "We're twins, which makes us unique, and since we're both warrior bots we've been causing trouble for the 'Cons for a long time. We're both considered a part of the best fighters in the Autobot faction as it's easier for us to sync each other in battle than normal bots. You can't take one down unless you take the other. Soundwave messed with my insides when I got caught, and I'm a ticking bomb to my twin, human, as much as I want to meet him."

Now the stakes were so high that Skyler had no idea what to do.

Both Autobot and human were silent on their dilemma for both of their twins for five long minutes. It was the human that broke the stillness.

"I feel we should think it over tonight, Sunstreaker," Skyler said. "I wouldn't want Sideswipe to get into Soundwave's hands either. That's just the same as me handing over Steve to him openly. There's got to be a better solution somehow, thinking with a hot head won't help."

Sunstreaker sighed, "I trust Sides to handle himself better than he did before we were separated, human. Your twin is the main matter."

"The safest route doesn't mean it's the likeable one. You and I both know if we do so that's both of our brothers in danger, Sunstreaker." Skyler clarified. "There is another way we just don't know yet. I'm sure of it."

The Autobot huffed, "Fine, human. We'll get something once the recharge is over. I hate the idea of getting fragged by Soundwave without preparations. But the faster we get out of here, the better chance of getting to your twin."

"I know. I know."

A snort. "Go recharge, human. I think I'll need some peace and quiet as well. I feel like my circuits are going to fry if I keep this up."

"See ya in the morning, Sunstreaker," the young man left without a glance back, but waved to the bot he was leaving as he headed for the stairs.

Another day in a life of a con man that worked as a paint job guy, Skyler couldn't believe that somehow 'funny' fate was moving its invisible strings on him. The death of his parents and sister in Mission City, plus him and Steve hacking into an unknown government organization server and defending it from another hacker against breaching turned out to be the same robots that attacked in Mission City, and getting kidnapped by an Autobot that was a part of the opposing robot faction. Even now, the Decepticon was most likely hunting him and his brother.

It all played into a large grand plan, and Skyler was certain Sunstreaker knew it as well.

_The cogs were turning._

_The players were coming into place._

_The greatest heist of the Universe was on._

__

* * *

 

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 2.01: The Same Enemy_

_Planet Earth, City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_Becoming the puppets to the one show called Destiny and so forth by Primus wasn't really what I'd call a good thing and I thought those things only happened to Big Boss who was the Prime. It was clear that I was going to experience a bit of it as well. Out of all the mess I ended up with, Skyler's situation shocked the frag out of me. Can you BELIEVE that the human and his twin actually bested Soundwave, the 'Con Intel officer, in a hacker war?_

_And that was without the human realizing he was going against a Cybertronian._

_Prowl would have definitely fried his circuits by now._

_It may sound CRAZY and even out of this universe, but the traces of Cybertronian encryption was more than enough to make me believe it was the TRUTH. No wonder Skyler managed to break the basic Cybertronian encryption when I tested him back when I escaped from the other fleshling's garage. Must have been only a game to him._

_The fact that I was the one who kidnapped him very much gave me the idea that Primus somehow had plans. Pit, I don't know what he wants and the whole thing just came down like a blast over me._

_Now that I know that I was really dealing with a dangerous enemy, there was simply no room to mess about. Without my navigation and communication systems I knew that I was on my own on this one. Of all the 'Cons I have gone against, it had to be Soundwave._

_Scrap._

_There's NO running away from this!_

_He wasn't your type of 'Con that would fight in battle, he was a strategist that would do what ever it took to stay on the planning table unless he had to come down himself by Megatron's orders. I'm really itching for some revenge for what he did to my bond with Sideswipe by throwing him into a smelter and letting him melt with agony, but with Skyler in the picture it made me think twice about what was I supposed to do._

_It was maddening that the both of us really had much to think about at night._

_I had thoughts of getting Skyler's twin first and heading for Nevada to rejoin the other Autobots. But would they actually accept the hacker who was also a trickster and a thief? It was the safest route, but if Soundwave found out I was still alive, then somehow he would hunt down Sides because the bond link he messed up in me wasn't perfect. He probably doesn't know I survived the torture since he predicted my odds of death were 99.9 percent at the time. The fragger didn't expect I'd make it out on the 0.01 percent._

_There are many dilemmas to boot and it all revolves on Skyler, his twin Steve and my twin, Sides. Sacrificing any of them wasn't an option._

_Slag it._

_With too many tough choices, I felt like my processor was going to fry._

_One thing was for sure, if both Skyler and I were going to get out of this mess._

_We'd have to take things to some drastic measures._

_~ Sunny._

__

* * *

 **TBC…**

**  
**

  



	7. 3rd Day of Crucial Plans, Taking the Different Drift of the Road

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 7: 3****rd**** Day of Crucial Plans, Taking the Different Drift of the Road ~**

****

* * *

 

_Con man Log Entry 2.02: Where to go? What to do? Danger on all sides._

_City of Memphis__, Tennessee, US__._

_I didn't sleep well that night._

_My thoughts were haunted by the fact that with the situation I was in, there was no way of running from it as I knew it would only make things worse._

_A con man's worst gamble…_

_Dilemma._

_Also known as the 'Wild Card'._

_In any sort of heist there's always a chance the 'Wild Card' comes out. But as its name implies, it's a double edged sword. It's either you win or you lose._

_The stakes are higher, the reward gets bigger, but the risk of losing is doubled or permanent for life._

_For me, I never expected it at all, that I would actually face one at my age of 21 as a con man. Even Uncle Danny went through this during the Bellagio heist, but that was at the point when he was already an experienced con man. I was still a rookie! It scared the total crap out of me that I had to face it so soon._

_The first was the fact that Steve and I have unknowingly blocked a breach into NEST and won a hacker war against the Decepticon Soundwave who was in fact the D'Con Intel Officer. He must have wanted revenge on us both or else he has orders to hunt us down by their boss because we were a threat to them. Saving and finding Steve was the most important factor before they find my twin. But where would we run off to next? I wasn't really looking forward to going to the military guys. Ok, I don't have any grudges or anything bad for them, it was the higher ups that I was more worried about._

_Second was the fact that Sunstreaker could not reunite with his twin, unless there was a way without getting caught or known by Soundwave. I soon realized the reason why he fainted that night was caused by Soundwave's tampering with him. I wasn't sure how it worked, but I was worried about the Autobot. There was no way I could save Steve without him. The fact he had finally found his twin after searching for so long made me feel that I had to think of some sort of way to get him back to Sideswipe without sacrificing his brother._

_Last but not least, how was I going to get through both accounts without screwing up? Both Steve and Sideswipe were in completely different places. There were just too many openings for the enemy to attack us and take either one of them!_

_I had a lot of ideas that night, I even jotted them down on paper, but most of them ended up getting burnt in the bin. I was frustrated, and I was restless. Heck, I think I just went mad. In the end I ended up having a three hour bath to calm myself down and managed to sleep for almost four hours. The only good thing I got out of it was a crazy idea that unpredictably came to my mind._

_I didn't like it._

_I was sure that Sunstreaker was going to HATE it._

_I really wanted to AVOID it._

_But it WAS an idea._

_And as long as it was at least somewhat favorable, I wasn't going to give up without a fight._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

"YOU WANT ME TO WHAT?" Sunstreaker yelled at the top of his voice capacitor volume.

Skyler covered his ears tightly and he could still hear it.

_Thank GOD my uncles are not around!_

The young man sighed and repeated, "Is it possible to change your alt-form or have different versions of alt-forms?"

All was a reply of a snarling grumpy growl.

The young man face-palmed his head.

Well, that went…_well._

_One hell of a way to start the morning._

Skyler was very glad people hardly came around to the garage.

Still not giving up, the con man asked, "Am I going to get a chance to explain myself?"

Sunstreaker's mood was already sour. "Pit. There better BE a slaggin' acceptable explanation, human!"

_Who does this human think he IS, demanding that I CHANGE my alt-form!_

"You still haven't answered my question," Skyler noted, trying to keep his own nerves down. "It adds up to my explanation."

Even though Skyler was sure it was possible to change alt-forms (as he saw the two twins Mudflap and Skids do through the photos) he still wanted to know the whole process in better detail. He knew that alt-forms had to correspond to the bot's overall mass, but what Skyler wanted to know was the part of how often they could change alt-forms. That, of course, was the most vital information he needed to know for his plan.

Sunstreaker however, did the unexpected. Moving from his car parking space, he transformed to his bi-pedal form in front of the human. The bot kneeled down till both human and bot were staring at each other face to face.

On the other hand, Skyler read this action as an intimidation tactic and controlled himself from flinching or running away. As much the Autobot was unpredictable with his mood at times, it didn't mean that the con man was not scared now and again going head on with an angry and grumpy 15 ft mech. Humans very much have it encoded into their DNA that something far larger than them would by instinct turn the flight reflex on, unless it was considered harmless. The largest animal on the planet - the blue whale - was harmless, but a mech that had weapons that could easily blow up an army base was something to be wary of. The con man had thought of the idea with a great deal of time, and wasn't going to let it go just yet. Not when it was an alternative and Sunstreaker had not heard the overall picture of his idea.

Blue optics stared down at cobalt eyes, scanning for any weakness.

The Autobot was none too happy about what he had heard about changing his alt-form. To any bot it was considered to be highly offensive to demand a change of an alt-form unless it was an official order. For sure, Sunstreaker knew the human didn't know that. What the human was thinking, Sunny did not know. The bot was out of ideas on how they would approach their situation with Soundwave, but the human said he had something. Seeing that the human was serious and did not falter from his intimidation by his transformation, Sunstreaker clearly saw something was driving the human's relentless intent.

"You already know that we can change alt-forms according to mass, human," Sunny remarked, still irritable.

Rephrasing what he meant, the young man said, "Alright, I'll be more specific. How frequently can you change between different versions of alt-forms with the same mass? I'm not saying different as in from a car to a truck, I'm asking from a car to a car with only different looks."

Sunstreaker frowned, unable to see where this was going.

Skyler was rather interested as he looked up to the bot and found how similar the Autobot's facial expressions were like on a human's face. It was probably since he rarely ever saw Sunstreaker in his bi-pedal mode that he hadn't noticed before.

The Autobot shrugged. "Transformation requires a good amount of energy. There's a lapse of time between transformations, which is about 4 of your earth hours." His face afterward changed into a scowl. "It's rather offensive for one to ask a mech to change their original alt-mode, human."

Seeing this as a horrible mistake in etiquette, Skyler immediately bowed to the bot in a form of an apology. "Sorry, Sunstreaker I didn't mean to offend-"

"You already _have_, human!" Sunny exclaimed in a pissed off tone. "Just make sure this idea of yours is actually _reasonable_ for the offense and I _might_ forgive you."

Seeing the bot being his ill-tempered self, Skyler knew the clock was ticking for his account.

"Very well," the young man readied himself as he squarely faced the Autobot. "My idea is this: we're going low profile, discreet, and most of all to confuse the Decepticons and Autobots alike."

A skeptic laugh, "THAT'S your idea? I don't like it, human."

"Hold on." The man raised his hand, sounding offended. "I don't like it any more than you do and I know I'm probably going to break a dozen laws or so. I can end up in jail for this, and I seriously wanted to avoid this. The lives of our twins are at stake here, ok? I don't really like the fact I'm going to be a runaway either, because we're going to have to be constantly moving. This is for Sideswipe and Steve."

Sunstreaker was agreeing to the fact they _both_ would suffer for it but was still wondering what it had to do with his alt-mode. He ushered the human to go on, while still glaring at him.

Observing that he'd gotten the Autobot's full attention, Skyler went on to his full explanation. "Right, the idea is that we're going to disguise ourselves by being as many different people as we can and avoid any authorities. We'll have to adapt as much as possible and utilize being another person."

"And where do I come in?" Sunny asked, not really impressed.

Skyler did not waver. "Humans with specific jobs or status have different types and styles of cars. If I'm acting as driver to a government official, your alt-form will follow as a government car, a police officer would have a police car and so forth. That includes normal civilian cars that are less distinctive. I'm going to change my clothes every now and then, you're going to have to adapt for your alt-form. That way we can blend in wherever we go."

The Autobot grunted, "Is there anything else good about this, besides that we're going to be hiding basically in plain sight?"

This time it was Skyler that gave the bot a challenging gaze, "Don't you want revenge on Dreadnought?"

Noticing that this was a very valid reason to listen to, Sunny nodded with interest.

"Disguising is our largest advantage we're going to get," the young man pointed out. "If it is a custom in your kind that you do not change your alt-form or color, then it's the last thing Dreadnought would expect. He's seen your current alt-form, but Dreadnought doesn't suspect you to have an alternative different one also by a different color. Even if he scans you, he won't tell the difference between the other cars since I'm inside you. We'll use that advantage to hunt him down and it'll make things easier to escape the crime scene."

Still not yet entirely convinced, although he was tempted by the fact he was going to get his kill soon, Sunny asked for the last confirmation he could get from the human. "So now I'm your criminal partner, human? Any more advantages from this?"

Skyler smiled, "Sunstreaker, Soundwave thinks you're dead, or at least dying somewhere far away from your twin. You stay dead to _him_, which makes it more of a reason to cause havoc without him knowing and disappearing without a trace. We make sure no one knows you're here. No one is going to suspect you're already here on earth or the perpetrator." A pause. Then he added, "It's the reason why we need to hunt down Dreadnought first, but also to keep the other Autobots at bay. Think of it like we're going as assassins, we keep this slaughter quiet, we can do more damage to the 'Cons and move more freely later."

The Autobot knew one thing was true.

_The human was frightening when he was given too much time to think_.

Sunstreaker was still reluctant about separating with his yellow exterior that made it him, but he considered it. Sideswipe was silver when he saw him, maybe it was the fact they weren't together that made his twin change his color. It must have pained him to be red when his yellow older twin brother wasn't around. Sunny was now realizing he must have caused a lot of pain on his younger twin's behalf and made a reminder in his mind that was the first thing he was going to apologize about to his twin when they reunited. Perhaps it was wise to change for the moment if this was for Sideswipe. Even though he was proud for his exterior, the thought of getting back at the 'Cons was more than tempting.

He considered that the human's plans were actually for his sake as well. Sunstreaker for one knew that the human was worried about both him and Sides, which surprised him. Not only had the idea covered the notion of getting revenge on the 'Cons, but it covered the safety of everyone. According to the idea, as long as Sunny was safely not known to Soundwave, Sideswipe would be able to keep fighting the 'Cons with the others and not be hunted by Soundwave, Skyler was less of a target for the 'Cons, there was a way to get to Steve carefully to rescue him and even hunt down a 'Con plus getting away with it without anyone knowing. Skyler wasn't the typical human who liked to stand out from the rest because of his thief nature; however the little human could be one if he wanted to and needed it which quickly came out when he blackmailed his victims. Sunstreaker soon realized that Skyler was actually staking on doing something he didn't like doing and was prepared to destroy his own life for his twin.

Skyler, seeing the bot in deep thought, added his last comment, "The disguises will hold up and only be used when we're around the crowded places and for a couple exit strategies, Sunstreaker. I've already offended you enough, but your current alt-form is the best for speeding and hunting Decepticons. Disguising doesn't change who we'll always be."

Without warning, the human Skyler was yanked off the ground by the bot with one hand, which made him yelp and swear as he was lifted off the ground. The human ended up sitting on his open palm, heart beating drastically while he breathed in and out rapidly in alarm. At first Skyler thought he had pissed off the bot to a great deal, but since the Autobot was not squeezing him with his fingers, there was at least a slight chance he wouldn't end up dead.

Sunstreaker stood to his full height with his optics focused on the human.

In a business manner, Sunny said, "Under _one_ condition."

Still recovering from the initial shock, the human only said one word. "Shoot."

"You are to tell NO ONE and not even the other Autobots can KNOW about me changing alt-forms. Especially my _color_," Sunstreaker stressed.

_He still had an image to live up to._

The young con man realized how much Sunstreaker valued his exterior - it was his real identity, as absurd as that it sounded. _Ego was more like it._ Even so, it wasn't the main point of everything. Making his idea acceptable to the bot (plus he managed to be forgiven even if the bot did not tell him) was one hard earned victory to the con man.

Skyler nodded energetically at that, "You got it. I break my promise; you can step on me and squish me into organic splat."

"I would get dirty from your organic remains." Sunstreaker rolled his optics. "I prefer to it settle it by shooting you."

"Well, that's better and less painful with instant death," Skyler mentioned.

"Crazy human."

The young man smirked. "Proud to be one, mech. If I wasn't, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now."

_Good point._

_And the human was very full of himself when he meant to be._

_Ironically the same as he was._

_Sunstreaker wasn't going to complain, the human was the best of what he did._

The Autobot easily ignored the comment. "When can we start?"

"Right now," Skyler stood up carefully as he balanced himself up on top of the bot's palm. "We can start by scanning a few of the cars that are in the garage. We'll get some more when we go for a drive."

"We're getting more?" Sunstreaker grumbled in a moan.

Skyler kicked into persuasion mode as he listed the things off, "It's by the rules of a con man. We've got recon, intel, plus a means of escape, we got firepower and a way of cutting out power, and I have contacts around a few cities near Nevada and Kansas City for our eyes and ears. All we need now is to practice."

Another skeptical look from the bot, "Practice? _We?_"

_That sounded unnerving._

"Practice makes perfect. Perfect results are the best results we're looking for," the young man shrugged his shoulders. "What better place to practice than a drive through town?"

To Skyler's disappointment Sunstreaker's body language was clearly ignoring the last statement. The human tried a different tactic.

"Don't tell me you're going to lose to those midget twins Mudflap and Skids. They could pull it off …" Skyler trailed off.

The reply was a snap, "WE'RE going NOW."

_That hit the mark effectively._

Skyler noted that heating up the bot with competitiveness worked well.

Sunstreaker groaned in reluctance.

_Primus, what have I gotten myself into?_

The Autobot warrior wasn't really looking forward to this.

* * *

A man in his mid twenties with dirty blond hair and blue eyes, wearing a silver jacket and black jeans, leaned against a wall, reading the newspaper he held.

He was tuning in on what the people were saying in that particular street without much an effort.

Especially when his real body was on the other side of the road.

Sideswipe huffed in holoform as he so far had not heard about any indications to as where the so-called rumor of the hacker was in the City. Kansas City was a large city; he had managed to avoid the more sketchy parts of town because of his alt-form. Silver was already too much of an attraction, he wondered how it would be in red.

Scrap.

_Sunny…_

_Where are you?_

Sighing sadly, he looked to the sky as if he was expecting Sunstreaker to come down as a meteor. Even with the arrival of both Mirage and Hound there wasn't a sign of his brother. Ever since the incident when he tried to reach his brother through the bond, Ratchet was in what humans called a 'mother hen fit' that he was never allowed to do it again. The CMO of the Autobots did not say why, only mentioned it was for his sake. Sideswipe was disappointed at the medic when there was a chance he could re-connect to his twin. Another tired breath escaped his holoform since for now he was still on a mission.

There was nothing to report to the Prime. There were the basic street thefts and shootings around the city, but no real leads towards the hacker that was supposedly detected here. The city itself was a rather large place to cover. So far, Sideswipe had only covered a few areas in vain since no one was giving any information that was worth tracking down. Information at times was hard to come by, so basically what he managed to get from the police radio and other communication systems was the same data Big Boss sent him from NEST.

So far it was like trying to find a needle in the Mariana ocean trench that was 10,000 km under water, rather than a haystack.

If he was going to find anything, it was going to happen by sheer damn slagging luck.

No Decepticon in sight either, which was another blow to the warrior mech as he was expecting things to be a little more exciting for his recon. The warrior mech wouldn't be pleased either if the mission ended up with nothing, he wasn't really keen to do the normal guardian duty like 'Bee. Of course the youngest of the Autobots had a friendship with the human Prime, but Sideswipe wasn't really all that close to Sam. If he ever did get to the Witwicky household, it wasn't like he'd have something to do other than watching and keeping his optics out for 'Cons. Samuel wasn't really the mischievous type either that would prank on another person.

_Pranks…_

Sideswipe shook his head to snap out of it as a hollow dull ache went through his spark. Even with the recently arrived Prowl, Sides wasn't at all in the mood to take on the Autobot Strategist for pranks. The more he thought about things, the more it all turned to his elder twin Sunny. He had badly wanted to turn to a bot or anyone who knew what he was feeling at the moment, but it seemed everyone had their own businesses to attend to. While he could speak with the medic, Sideswipe stubbornly kept himself away from the med bay unless it was absolutely necessary.

Seeing as there was nothing left he could read on the newspaper, he folded it and headed to a nearby coffee café. Humans had a tendency to spill out information while sitting down with a drink. Sideswipe headed inside and ordered a latte, and sat in the corners where there were a couple of humans on the other tables. The place wasn't really extravagant; it was more down to earth as many who were in the room weren't from the higher class. He fiddled around with the paper menu on the desk as he waited for his order. Hound, Mirage and Wheeljack had done an amazing thing to make holoforms that were solid and could actually consume human food, but it wasn't really something that was essential, as Cybertronians could go on without energon for decades. It was basically made so they wouldn't look conspicuous in dining areas and what basically Big Boss had come to terms with because it was also another step to learn about human dinning and culinary culture.

To Sideswipe, it wasn't really a big deal, but the ability to do recon in areas where humans talked a lot was worth it.

The warrior mech had deliberately chosen a table in middle so he could extend his hearing throughout the room. Sideswipe happily thanked the waiter for his latte and sipped it slowly as he listened to the humans around him. Topics ranged to different things, family, dates, break-ups, what to do for the weekend, and even to upcoming events that the humans were looking forward to like the World Cup on soccer/football. He planned that if there wasn't any real information around the place he'd hit the next social hangout that might be a good place to get information.

Two hours later with his second cup of latte, Sideswipe decided that there wasn't anything worth his interest and was preparing to leave when the two men behind him started to act anxious while whispering frantically. Even their heart rates were not normal. Curiosity aroused, he listened in.

"You idiot!" The harsh whisper seemed a shout to the Autobot's keen ears. "Didn't I tell you not to use normal lines? They're not safe. We're already being tracked down."

"Ok- ok- ok," the man said rapidly. "At least the company guys don't know it, ok? Just cut me some slack, dude. I'm new to the organization."

"You won't be if you keep it up," the other said with a sigh. "Remember, we got to get more info about those 15 invitees. The big guy wanted us to know more about their families so we can coax them to use the codes for the breach."

"Right, right," the inexperienced man exhaled. "I don't see how these hackers he's looking for are going to help us."

A snort. "Face it kid, who ever gets them can obviously hack into government data. You blackmail the government, you control the country. So far we got potentials on who might be the Furta duo. It might only be one of them or if we're seriously lucky, it's both. It's why we need to make 'em spill everything out."

_Furta duo?_

Sideswipe tensed at that. It was the hackers' nicknames!

Then a cell phone rang. The more experienced man picked it up.

"Hello? Yes, it's me." There was a loud yell that made the man wince. "Sorry boss, haven't found any yet. We'll grab it right now and be there ASAP."

The newer member of the group looked expectantly for orders as his senior stood up.

"Hurry, we need to pick up the info package at the boss' local informant. Said that the guy there has some good info that can make them talk or break codes we prepared for 'em. He doesn't like waiting."

The two shabby and shrouded men quickly exited the coffee café and entered a car as they both feared their boss' wrath.

Knowing this was finally the lead he was looking for; Sideswipe made his holoform walk hastily from the coffee shop to his body, got in, then turned the engine on.

:: Sideswipe to Big Boss ::

There was a silence before the Prime answered his call. :: Optimus Prime to Sideswipe. Hear you loud and clear. What's wrong, Sideswipe? ::

:: I got a lead on some shady humans that may be related to the hackers that blocked the breach to NEST. :: Sideswipe reported.

:: Any clear indications of who they are? :: a hopeful tone was sent through the comm.

The silver mech paused. :: Some sort of organization, but I don't think they're legal by any terms. I think they've kidnapped a few humans in the process trying to find the real hackers. ::

:: Your location? ::

:: Downtown Kansas City, I'm going to try and follow them. :: Sideswipe was now on the road, driving as he kept an eye on their car and keeping his distance at the same time. :: So far no 'Cons in sight or on radar. ::

Knowing that it was a good lead, Optimus agreed with his subordinate, :: Good, keep following them until you can get more information. But remember, we are not to hurt the humans, bad or otherwise. ::

:: Crystal clear, Big Boss. :: Sideswipe sighed.

:: Keep me updated as soon as you find anything else. ::

:: Yes, sir. Sideswipe out ::

:: Prime out. ::

* * *

Sunstreaker felt _dreadful_.

_Wait, scratch that._

He felt _absolutely outrageously terrible_ like someone threw him into a burning smelter.

He was missing his original color already.

_Badly._

To be more on 'civil terms' he was now using a silver Honda Civic alt-mode. The human said it was a lot more common than the Lamborghini form he had for his original alt-form he'd acquired. Sunstreaker didn't complain about how its shape wasn't so bad for his mass, but the fact that it wasn't really comfortable for speeding left much to be desired. The Autobot had an internal clock that his next transformation (or when he could return or change to another version of his alt-form) wasn't due in another two hours. Time went by so slowly that he felt Primus was there laughing at him for it.

Downtown Memphis was crowded with all those annoying fleshlings everywhere, which disgusted him to no end. He was even scolded by the human on how to 'act' as a normal 'civil' car. The fact he was what humans called a sports car was a reason why he got away with using electric shock so people don't touch him or suddenly speeding up. Humans seemed to have a lot of expectations for how a certain driver with a different car should react behind the driving wheel, which made Sunny peeved, as there was much he had to learn and needed more practice. Even for that certain occasion, the human was in a disguise as well.

The human Skyler looked very funny for one; he seemed to add on more curly hair to his head, by using what Sunny heard was a wig and mustache. Although, what the Autobot did see was the fact that just by doing a few changes the human looked slightly older and even not looking like before. It somewhat amazed the bot how a little hair and make-up could completely change the human's features.

The other fact he was feeling uncomfortable with was that the human was touching him by the driving wheel.

"How can you tolerate doing something like this?" Sunstreaker muttered. "Being someone else you are not?"

Skyler raised an eyebrow at the question. "With tons of practice. It's really annoying at first. I screwed up badly on my first tries against my uncles and aunts. It ended up as the laugh for 'family' meetings for months. But once you get used to it, there are benefits."

"Well, I don't like the fact you're acting like you're driving me," the bot said bluntly.

Skyler sighed. "It will be too conspicuous if I don't, Sunstreaker. People can see through the windows."

"Any way you can 'drive' me without touching the wheel so much?" Sunstreaker complained outright. "It's uncomfortable."

The young man quickly thought up a swift solution. "Tint your windows so it's visible from the inside, but it's not so visible from the outside. Make it darker."

Sunstreaker did so in an instant and Skyler relaxed more and used the wheel less.

"Better?" the con man asked.

"Hmm."

That for one meant a yes, but Skyler was on his toes when it came to make sure that Sunstreaker was comfortable with him. Skyler knew that on the long road ahead they would most likely encounter situations that would require teamwork in a sense of blending in. Sunstreaker for one was not an exactly friendly bot unless he let someone into his circle, and even then he could be just as stubborn. The young con man was willing and patient to make sure that he had everything covered when he had to work with the bot. His current practice was to make the bot able to 'socialize' as a human car would on the roads, which meant he was teaching Sunstreaker about the types of cars around, how to act them out, more about traffic rules, to even point out how ID numbers or car plates had specific owners and showed where they came from (whether they were from out of town or they were in town).

For most of the way Sunstreaker was irked at how useless his offlined communication systems were, even if Skyler suggested that if they could try hooking him up to some sort of satellite device he thought there was a chance that the Autobot might get an internet connection. His idea was flattened out by the fact that was not possible as it would overload the human communication device and fry it as Sunstreaker explained the incompatibility of human tiny devices for him to use extensively. The only thing he could do was mostly to hack in or sabotage a device. It was probably the first time Skyler understood that the Autobot was in a dire need of information, why he was utterly lost if he didn't have guide, and why there were many things the bot did not understand. He made a note once they got back he'd grab more external discs from Uncle Neil's room and let Sunstreaker learn more about things on Earth in general.

As they traveled from the downtown area, to the parks and different landmarks of Memphis, Skyler was feeling rather bothered by the fact he couldn't visit them. There was much to see and do as it was May. During this time of year there was the 'Memphis in May', which hosted various events all over town. He dismissed those thoughts as he thought of his twin, who was in danger somewhere out there. All those things would just have to wait until later. The good part was the fact there were many types of cars that were around to scan for Sunstreaker to get data on them.

"You're going to disguise yourself as the authorities?" Sunstreaker asked in interest as he scanned a car requested by Skyler that happened to be a Ford Police Interceptor. "Didn't you say you're avoiding them?"

"They're unlikely to ask us or be suspicious of anything if we keep on scanning local ones too, every state has their own markings and so forth," Skyler motioned. "It's also a good exit strategy as they probably won't think of us as suspects if we need to make a run for it. I doubt they would consider one of their own as suspects unless they check. Is something wrong?"

There was a huff from the Autobot. "Acceptable reason, although I don't really like it as the form is more suited to someone who sticks to the rules through and through like Prowl. I don't like following too many rules."

"Well, I'm a thief and I'm acting out as a police officer. Or any authority I usually go against for your other alt-forms," Skyler added. "Just enjoy the fact that they're being fooled right in front of their eyes, Sunstreaker. Then when they realize it, we're miles away. A con man is just a more…sadistic prankster. It's the targets you choose that defines whether you do it with moral fun or no morals at all."

Sunstreaker couldn't help but agree with that as he chuckled, "Anything to break the rules, human? If Prowl ever gets his 'aft on this planet, I'm dragging you with me and Sides to prank him. What do you say?"

"I accept, Autobot. Let Steve in as well and it's a deal," the young man said in eagerness.

"No regrets of you and your twin getting locked in the brig?" Sunny joked.

Skyler laughed at that, "Man, Sunstreaker. You know when you prank a person that there'll be consequences, and you probably know as well as I do that having a prank work on the victim makes that trouble or consequence so worth it. You got yourself a partner in crime, mech."

"Hmph, Prowl isn't exactly nice; you might end up hours on end in the brig. But if you're up to it then I'll take your word."

The young man waved his hand, "Not a problem. Being in the brig gives me more time to think up the next prank for revenge, it's the worst judgment they could ever make as a punishment. How much time left until you can change back to your Lamborghini form?"

"Prank treaty confirmed, human," Sunstreaker said as he was pleased at it. He paused as he checked his internal clock. "About 45 of your Earth minutes."

The young man nodded. "We should head back then, but take your time. You still need to change back so my uncles don't get suspicious or think I've stolen another car."

"I don't think they'll be disappointed if you did steal another car, human," Sunny pointed out. "More like they'd praise you for it."

"Fair point. They would be thrilled to get a brand new one to add to their collection, but that doesn't explain how I lost a Lamborghini."

"And that's a big deal?"

"Trust me, Sunstreaker. When you're in a family of con artists, points go down if you get caught or lose things. Points go up for stealing or conning influential people good or bad and stealing things that people would buzz about you for months and if it's legendary, it's for all time," Skyler gave an explanation of the ins and outs of why it was a big deal.

Hearing about it Sunstreaker couldn't help but ask, "So who's the best?"

"My uncles are if you count them as a group," Skyler said proudly. "Uncle Danny is the one with ideas, Uncle Rusty usually helps him out perfecting them and the whole team works wonders. Pretty famous in the thievery world; they usually settle on long cons though, different from what you would call a 'cat burglar' or a thief that does things solo."

The bot was intrigued. "And how did your uncles come to be legendary con artists? Must have been quite a show."

"Are you kidding?" the young man said with excitement. "Robbing a vault belonging to the most famous casinos in Vegas that have higher security than the military, going against the best 'proclaimed' cat burglar the 'Night Fox' and winning? They even went as far as kicking a hotel and casino owner out by making it bankrupt in one night! I'm still a far way behind them before I get there."

"Tell me about the vault con," Sunstreaker deciding that it may be worth hearing.

Skyler of course launched into the full account and details that made it one of the most legendary heists of all time.

Sunstreaker without a care drove much slower than he normally did, feeling content for the first time in a long time. It was funny that he had been so uncomfortable just a few hours ago in an alt-form that he never wanted and even in a different color, now Skyler was able to be a good distraction. The human inside him was smart enough and even went to lengths to make sure he felt comfortable without really showing his intent or sympathy until the bot realized it much later, as Sunstreaker never really liked others being sympathetic to him. Even amongst the other Autobots not many realized how to approach him except for Sides. Perhaps Jazz too was an exception because he was so easy going, but with the others, Sunstreaker never felt like working as a real team.

To think he would actually consider a _human_ a partner in crime…

_Definitely not like him._

Yet, he didn't care.

People who had the same way of thinking were hard to come by in the universe.

Especially when they were a twin as well.

* * *

_Hours later…_

Humans were wild when they get insane ideas.

After listening to a full account of what Skyler's uncles were capable of, Sunstreaker understood that humans who were con artists were very cunning strategists. One thing that surprised the warrior mech was that the 'family' had a rule to focus on people who by any means were abusing power financially where the government and law enforcement could not touch them. They played by the rules, and even bent the laws to the point that their victims were unable to get back at them. All in all, the Autobot understood that while the human with him was young, he did have a potential to turn into his uncles. Yet, what probably piqued Sunstreaker's interest the most was when Skyler mentioned about having an 'extensive family'.

Bonds that were made even though they were not related by heredity or blood.

Sunstreaker knew very well that humans did not have sparks, but nevertheless they were extremely fierce in defending their extended family just as real families would. The Autobot learned from Skyler they had a rule that 'if you messed with one, you'd go against the whole 'family''. In a sense, Sunny was reminded that it was similar to how the Autobots as a whole were together even if it was because of the war. He somewhat missed the lot, he had been alone for so many eons that seeing them was something he was looking forward to once the mess was over.

He watched silently as ever as the human and his two uncles were in deep conversation about plans on heading to Kansas City. Maps were doodled on; contacts were added, and even time for traveling was estimated. From what Sunstreaker had heard, it was an 8 hour drive from Memphis to Kansas City and that was if the road conditions were good, not too crowded during the morning traffic rush or there weren't any weather disturbances. It was easy for the bot to cut travel time when he was in the highway areas and the only problem then was to kill the 'Con that was tracking him.

Skyler went so far as checking and re-checking things he was bringing with him, with the help of Franz. Weapons, gadgets and other things were selected for more durable and easy to bring purposes. The weapons expert even taught and gave Skyler notes on the cartridge shells that could blow up things. Skyler was thankful for it, even though he was very sure at their current situation there wasn't any luxury time to make any of them. He was going to have to settle with 30 ready for use cartridges, which meant he'd have to conserve ammo and use it when he really needed it.

His Uncle Neil had given him various disguises - five, in fact - that would help him on the way. But even so there were plenty of contacts in the area that if Skyler needed anything he'd just have to meet them. The elder man was really feeling generous to the younger con man he brought in more external drives of information for his nephew to tap into and store away.

In the end, Skyler had two bags with him. One was solely for storing away supplies and the last was for weapons and gadgets. They all settled in for the night after both the Uncles had a quiet dinner with Skyler.

Night quickly became morning and it was finally the day of departure.

The young con man said his goodbye to his uncles, thanking him for their hospitality during the stay with a hug. They too gave their prayers and wishes of good luck to their nephew in rescuing his twin brother. The entire luggage was in Sunstreaker's trunk, and soon Autobot and con man exited the premises of the house.

"So, human. Where to?" Sunstreaker asked.

"We're heading north. The first town is about an hour's drive from here. We're going to be going through a bit of morning traffic first."

The Autobot wasn't really bothered by it; it wasn't like they were in an extreme hurry.

"By the way, Sunstreaker. You think Dreadnought will follow us right now?" Skyler questioned.

"He isn't called a tracker for no reason, human. But he is rather bulky. Even if he does we'd get there before he can even try to start making a real chase on us."

The con man smiled, "That's good to hear. It makes things a lot simpler."

"Having plans already?" Sunstreaker asked slightly astounded.

"Yeah, I slept with making plans for it," Skyler chuckled. "It wasn't like I could talk it over with my uncles."

_Looks like the hunt is going to be a good one._

Sunstreaker in his Lambo form maneuvered the roads as he followed instructions from the human. Just minutes after they left the house they were cornered by the human car traffic of the morning. Like always, they got plenty of stares from onlookers, and some femmes in a car next to them wrote out their phone number on a large piece of cardboard and showed it to Skyler. Both bot and human only laughed at their antics.

Much of the traffic was used as time to discuss plans in stops and checkpoints of the roads they were going to pass by or visit.

But plans were plans.

The best thing was doing them and seeing results.

_It was about time they started the real insane journey._

__

* * *

 

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 2.02: The Main Mission Starts._

_Planet Earth, City of Memphis, Tennessee, US._

_Earth's weather today was bright and not so much wet. It was probably a good sign on the start of the long awaited mission with the human Skyler._

_For a very Pit fraggin' reason the three days we stayed in Memphis felt longer than I would have expected. I suppose when you learn a lot of things going on there is a lot of hassle to settle through. There was the human organization that was working with the Autobots, Soundwave, my twin, Sides, and Skyler's twin, Steve. It was as complicated as it could get, but at last it was time to set out and get the gears into it._

_While I wasn't too happy with using a lot of different alt-forms, it was good to feel the roads again on my wheels._

_To think I've agreed to CHANGE MY ALT-FORM!_

_I think I really GLITCHED myself this time._

_At least I wasn't the only one to suffer as well._

_This is for my twin Sideswipe and Skyler's twin Steve._

_Our main mission was to head to Kansas City as soon as possible without alerting authorities, Autobots, and Decepticons. In many occasions I have been able to avoid and even use stealth to stay away from prying optics of the 'Cons. But hiding against the Autobots, who were my own faction? Primus, all I hoped was the fact that Hound wasn't around. 'Bee's a good scout but Hound's sensors are far more sensitive. Maybe having my comm. out of order right now was a good thing. Hound's style was to track down by detecting transmissions (especially Cybertronian ones), but add the fact that there were so many human transmissions around this planet and not in a state of war was a good disruption. It was unlikely he would listen to all the transmissions from the humans' telecommunications systems as there were far too many._

_If anyone was going to know it was me, it was Sides._

_Although now that we were on the roads again there was a chance that Dreadnought would be on our tail very soon. Dreadnought is a rather sneaky 'Con if you know him. I may have been hiding in Memphis for those three days, but somehow I was sure he was someplace else hiding, waiting for the right moment and pretty much tracking me down like the rusty coward he was._

_He was the immediate danger I had to deal with first._

_And for that, I was prepared to take extra caution and maximize my scanners._

_I was even certain that Skyler also had plans of his own and even extra plans to take him down as well. The human was smiling that prankster's smile like he was when I first met him during the time in Louisiana conning the fat fleshling. I was curious about the plans he would come up with. We were a real odd combination to say the least. Hopefully we can take down the 'Con without too much damage, as his tough armor and his way of running is the reason why he still lives and has survived so many battles. THIS time I was going to make sure that he'd be offlined._

_It's not like he'll expect to me have a human to help me take him down._

_He was going to be so fraggin' offlined when I get my hands on him._

_I'm really going to savor the moment his spark is burnt out._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

  
**TBC…**

 

**   
**


	8. A Con Man 'Con Sniper, Revenge is Best Served Cold

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 8: A Con Man 'Con Sniper, Revenge is Best Served Cold ~**

****

* * *

  
_Con man Log Entry 2.03: Orion's with Lady Luck._

_Town of Jonesborough, Tennessee, US._

_   
_

_Revenge is a funny thing._

_It was a quote that my uncles love to use in their work being Con Artists._

_And when work came with revenge, you just had to go all out._

_No 'buts'._

_No mercy._

_No exceptions._

_You never give the sucker an even break._

_That morning the traffic was kind of bad, so we arrived in Jonesborough a bit over the hour. Sunstreaker was in his silver Honda Civic alt-mode, not really standing out in the parking area, which was good as it was a small populated town. It was better not getting any sort of attention. We were at a local dine-in area so I could get a quick breakfast before we hit the roads again. I wasn't really in any disguises for now, I pretty much simply acted as the usual 'road trip lad', asking for directions and how the town was doing. Things didn't change much here as it was an older town that contributed to the growth of Memphis City. Most of the buildings were like 1930's old and it was quiet with the lack of young people around._

_It seemed like we were going to get a smooth ride to Kansas City._

_But I thought too soon._

_Just as I finished my breakfast I was looking through the windows, as a natural con man it was a necessity that one had to be very perceptive of their surroundings. The first rule was to never ever let your guard down, which I was glad for when I saw something that caught my eye. My con man's mind shouted out at me since it stood out like a thorn in my sight. Well, it was more of a 'metallic' thorn. It was as if lady luck was showing from the stars that Orion the Hunter was on our side._

_A Decepticon._

_You guessed it._

_It was Dreadnought._

_I quickly thanked the locals for the help and their generosity, paid a tip to the waitress, and walked calmly to where Sunstreaker was. Even before I put the keys in_   
_ the door_   
_ he unlocked it. It was clear he was excited._

_Who knew the hunt would start so soon?_

_The Con is on._

_And as they say…_

_Let the games begin._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

Both Autobot and human stared at a specific vehicle that passed by on the road.

"You'd think he, being a tracker, would have picked a more subtle form," Skyler commented in a bored tone as he was sitting inside Sunstreaker a map spread out in his hands.

Sunstreaker snorted through the speakers. "Like I said, human, he's a tracker without the working processors to think up a good disguise. Stupid son of a glitch."

Skyler shrugged. "Better for us. He's passed this road seven times and doesn't even know you're here."

"Ten," Sunstreaker corrected. "You were eating."

"Even so, looks like we're good to keep on using disguises," the con man said. "Sorry for making you remove any sign of the Autobot faction badge inside your interior earlier."

"No need to apologize, human. Your plan has worked this far," Sunstreaker said convincingly.

It was a fact that the human had a great thing for logic, but to Sunstreaker's comfort Skyler was more 'expressive' when it came to it than Prowl. Sunstreaker was fairly certain that if he had an Autobot faction indication right now Dreadnought would spot him out of the rest of the cars. He was also glad that he was reminded by the human to get the markings off from his previous alt-form and revert to the original. This mission did require full stealth anyway.

The con man smiled but still scratched his head, "I don't know about you, but having an alt-form of a tourist mini-bus does kind of stand out. Not to mention having a bumper sticker on the back with a Decepticon symbol and the lack of tourists inside. He could have settled for something else."

"It was probably the best thing passing by that suited his mass. I doubt if he would care what it was," the bot said, not really caring himself. "So, now what? Are we going to hunt him down?"

Skyler shook his head. "No can do. At least not yet, since there's no car junkyard in this area! It's important to get rid of his remains later. We don't want any Autobot or Decepticon finding his remains. He's larger than I expected though, I suppose the best place is to kill him is in a car junkyard, so we don't have to haul his dead body anywhere. I wasn't expecting to run into him this early."

The Autobot growled. "And here I thought I could start offlining him. Tch. Any better ideas?" Sunstreaker did not want all the practice and other alt-forms he attained yesterday to be for nothing.

Of course the young man had not expected to find the Decepticon this early. _They__ had__ just left town less than two hours ago and here was the enemy in front of them!_ Skyler wasn't exactly panicking, but he was upset that he had to get the gears in his brain to work over his previous plans. Most of them were ruined; he knew he had to prepare his backup plans immediately. In an instant, he remembered the words Uncle Reuben said once to him about screwed up plans.

_When your plans are screwed, you have to do it._

_Think quick, think facts, know your details, and slice like a goddamn guillotine._

_If you get caught, the fun was over._

_Do as you're told, you're the victor._

With that advice in mind, he decided that facing the large D'Con was an idiotic thing to do at this time. Size was a real hazard factor here - since Dreadnought took a form of a mini tourist bus he was most likely larger than Ratchet, who disguised himself as Rescue vehicle. The fact that in the town they were in now, it was easy to spot out the 'Con, wasn't really helping in how to erase the crime scene. Too many people would see them in broad daylight and be in danger, in addition that would definitely get the media's attention. Hell, the area didn't exactly provide locations that were good to hide for sniping, either.

If they couldn't do any slaying here because of all the hassle, there was another alternative. _Relocate._ If what Sunstreaker said was true that he wasn't exactly smart, then the 'Con would follow. The young man thought he might as well ask.

"Hmm, well, so far he's been following us without a fault," Skyler said, thinking out aloud. "Does he react well to insults?"

"Pit, no. It's easy to make his circuits fry because he's a pompous 'aft, thinks he's big and all but still makes a run for it behind others," Sunstreaker answered. Curious, he asked, "What's with the questions?"

Skyler shrugged, "Just doing the rules checklist of the Con."

"Rules of the Con?" the bot asked confused. And here he thought he'd heard everything.

"The primary rules, rules that keep to the con man code. They're the most important rules to all con artists when you con someone. If you don't follow them, then you're a lousy con man," the young man said. "So far we've passed the first one and the most important part, which is rule number one."

Sunstreaker waited as he expected for an answer.

"First rule to the Con, you can't cheat an honest man or person," Skyler pointed out. "Dreadnought is full of himself; we're going to use that ego of his to lure him in. So that leads us to the second rule."

"Which is?" the bot trailed off.

"Always stay a step ahead of the mark," Skyler said. "If the Decepticon is so full of himself as a tracker, he'll follow us to the ends of the earth. We're leaving to do our next gag."

This time, Skyler remembered he called someone last night that had dropped by in a city just south of Kansas City. Perhaps it was a good idea to speed up things and reestablish old connections. The city also happened to have a car junkyard there on the outskirts which made it a better alternative to get rid of Dreadnought there.

Again both bot and human were staring at the mini-bus that continued wandering around the same road for what seemed to be the fourteenth time that morning.

"We're leaving now?" Sunstreaker sounded disappointed.

Skyler now having read the 'Con's movements, patted his hand on the steering wheel lightly, "Yes. Sunstreaker, we're going to use the roads on the other side of town to get to the interstate road. We're going a bit slowly, but we won't bump into Dreadnought right now. We're at a disadvantage if we engage him now. Not that we're really running away, we're going to lure him in. Let's go."

Trusting the human, Sunstreaker followed directions as he drove out of the parking lot and used the outer road of the town, acting like a normal car. Feeling a bit miffed that he didn't know what was really going on, he commented, "We're supposed to offline him and not let him follow us. If you say it's true that we're going to get him in a car junkyard, is there one in the area to where we're going?"

"Yes. Closest one around is on the outskirts of Springfield, another city north of where we are with a approximate driving distance of over three and a half hours from where we are," the young man explained. Confidently the con man said, "But I know you can make it in less time since it's the open road of the highway. How long till your next transformation limit?"

"About an hour and thirty seven minutes. Since we're speeding, we're using my real alt-form?" Sunny asked reasonably.

The con man nodded, "It matches up with our rule number two. The fact that Dreadnought is a mini-bus adds in more time for us. He'll travel more slowly because of his mass; add another factor that buses alike can't use the fastest side of the highway/freeway lane to overtake other drivers, it means more preparation time for us." He concluded, "We're a step ahead of the mark, and the trap we're setting is in the city of Springfield."

Still keeping his scanners on the D'Con as Dreadnought was falling behind them the bot said, "Tell me about this trap we're setting, human."

"Well, let's just say that there's an old friend who's currently staying in Springfield for three days. He's a very talented hacker who's also a fixer, but specializes in a certain type of system without getting caught. I called in yesterday and he said he was good to do a con job, he's a bit low on cash since he's a _grifter drifter_, so I offered to pay him."

"Grifter drifter?" the Autobot repeated as it sounded unfamiliar to him.

"A con man that never stays in one place," Skyler replied. "Grifter is another word for a con man; drifter pretty much means what it is."

"Right," Sunny understood. "But I don't see why you would actually pay him."

"It's part of the tools of trade. I'm going to give it like a rub on the back," the young man with positivism. "That way if we're ever in trouble in the future, he'll be around to help. I'd do the same in turn. Not to mention his family of cons is larger than mine."

Sunstreaker huffed, "Hmph, so what makes this fleshling's hacking so special?" The bot paused. "He has a larger 'family' than yours?"

"His name is Yao Phing. He's Chinese, so he pretty much has a lot of connections to every Chinatown and Chinese restaurant around the States. Huge con family," Skyler said fondly, enlightened. "He, Steve, and I were Uncle Nagel's students. Steve and I went on a broader terms, he went for specialization. I consider him a 'brother in arms'."

"And just what can he do?"

Skyler smiled, "Something that will help you get Dreadnought where you can kill him."

"Specialization?" the Autobot asked specifically.

"Hacking into any city's major traffic management and monitoring system in less than a minute."

"I like the sound of that," Sunny said impressed. "This hunt is going to be fun."

"It will be." Skyler was sure of it. "Another two right turns and we're on the freeway."

Sunstreaker kept his visuals on the road. "Alright. But if I'm going to change alt-form we'll have to stop briefly."

The young man checked the map again. "Don't worry about it; there are a few small towns on the road. Once your time is up we'll make the change for your real alt-form. When we get to Springfield it's another camouflage. As for the hunt, we're doing it at night. Less traffic on the road, the darkness gives us cover, and the car junkyard will be deserted."

"The way you're talking all about this and your heart elevation rising, it looks like you're setting more of prank than a kill, human," the Autobot teased.

Skyler's face went red in embarrassment as if he was naked. "Am I that obvious? But you know that a con is just a more elaborate type of prank."

Sunny chuckled, "If you had scanners you would notice. Although I never thought I'd do a prank for a 'Con."

Shoving all the embarrassment aside, Skyler breathed out to get a hold of himself and his dignity. "Well, there's always a first time for everything, right?" the young man suggested with a chipper tone. "Once you've tried it, it's hard to let go."

The Autobot's mind drifted a bit before he asked, "So what's your reason for being a con man?"

The youth was silent at first. "The art and science of conning, you know, seeing all those different angles. The intuitive, challenging, daring, and part of getting back at nobbish bastards of society who don't appreciate the genuine people who work hard and serve the country all their lives. It kinda comes from the family motto of..." Skyler hesitated, then let the sentence hang for a moment before adding, "A freedom to be creative."

"No wonder you declined to join the military. Even if you did get in you'd probably have resigned yourself," Sunstreaker laughed. He knew the family thing left questions, and that it was best to ignore it unless the human wanted to explain it. Basically it wasn't really the right mood to discuss about the matter.

Looking forward to happier things, Sunstreaker was thrilled to get to work soon. "Let's get to the execution plans."

Skyler grinned, "You got it, mech-in-crime."

"Spill the details, human."

* * *

Chief Sergeant Robert Epps paced back and forth.

_What was taking him so long?_

"Bobby, you're making me dizzy. Can't think while standing still?" said the silver Pontiac Solstice in front of him.

Epps immediately went to a halt. "I think we've been waiting for a good deal of time, Jazz. There hasn't been a transmission from Sideswipe overnight."

"Don't worry about it; I'm sure Sides just needs some quiet time for more stealth. It's not like he's been away for too long or the last transmission said he was in trouble," Jazz said lightly. "He's been through many recons and came back without a scratch."

The human sergeant sighed, "Sorry, but I can't calm down. You know the fact that most of those times he was with his twin, right?"

This time there was an uncomfortable silence on the Autobot lieutenant's part.

Epps put his hands in front in defense, "Sorry again, man. I totally jinxed it with that one. No offense."

"No offense taken," Jazz reassured. "Once Optimus is out from the meeting he might have received a transmission from Sideswipe. If he hasn't, then we'll try to contact Sideswipe again."

Epps did finally ease up a bit by standing still, even if his face was filled with worry. Jazz couldn't blame him though; Sideswipe was a part of his responsibility on base and off base according to the human agreement treaty. Considering Sideswipe's mission was quite sudden, it was little help to most of the other Autobots were currently at Diego Garcia.

The only good thing about Sideswipe's lead had meant all the other Autobots that were on Diego Garcia were called into the mainland for safety measures. Even though there wasn't any visible Decepticon activity, they weren't taking any chances. Still it was going to be several more hours before they landed on American soil.

Major Lennox, of course, was with the Autobot Commander, attending meetings with the Sec. Def. John Keller on what they would plan to do if the hackers were found. There was a rather tense and dodgy debate with Director Galloway, as the liaison was seeking to get the hackers for himself and the people of the parliament were supporting him in hopes that they would be able to 'crack the code' of getting alien technology. It was clear that Galloway wanted them as tools, on the other hand, Optimus wanted to make sure both hackers, whoever they were, would still have the freedom to choose.

Epps was annoyed that he wasn't allowed in the meetings, but Lennox did not want to risk making matters worse. Well, the sergeant did admit he always said what was on his mind bluntly, so staying out of those meetings was a much wiser choice.

Especially since the negotiations were headed downhill.

Much to their chagrin, they were now in a tight spot and Galloway was doing the 'evil laugh' because the very soldier they sent to investigate on the leads of the hackers was the one that had been convicted for attacking the liaison. Sam couldn't help much as he was currently at Princeton like last time. So if Sideswipe failed…they would be in big trouble.

_Failure wasn't an option when it came to this mission._

_Especially with the damage costs after the whole 'the Fallen' mess._

Knowing how all those things were stacking up on the Autobots and their supporters, Jazz was highly aware how it was affecting his charge. It was probably the reason why he had orders from Prime to stay behind and accompany Epps while Lennox and Optimus, General Morshower, and the Sec. Def were discussing possibilities of approaching their situation against Galloway.

Seeing as it was time to 'loosen up', Jazz asked the man near him, "Epps, how about we go for a drive?"

"Now?" Epps asked doubtfully.

"Just to clear your mind a bit," Jazz suggested as he opened the door. "We wouldn't want ya to panic if we're called to Kansas City now, do we?"

"But what if there's an emergency transmission?"

Jazz came closer to Epps with his door still open. "If there are any transmissions to the Boss, I'll be the first or at least the second to know from him."

He wasn't all that convinced, but Epps agreed anyway to calm himself down. They drove by the base with other soldiers either waving at them or saluting as they passed. He was still nervous, but at least Jazz was considerate in trying to give him a 'time-out'. However, there was something that he wished to ask but never had a chance.

"Jazz? Can I ask you something?"

"Sure thing," the bot said brightly. "Ask away."

"I've been thinking about it," Epps said hesitantly. "What's Sunstreaker like? I've only heard from Ratchet and Prowl about some…_appalling_ 'things' about him. Do you have a, you know, moderate opinion?"

"Just what did Ratchet and Prowl say to describe Sunny?" Jazz asked curiously.

With difficulty, the sergeant shrugged. "Uh, they said that Sunstreaker was an egoistical 'aft and a glitching no-gooder that would drive 'em crazy. Whatever that means…"

Jazz laughed, which made Epps more confused.

"Did I miss something?" Epps questioned.

"Nah, nothing. It's just the nature of twins, that's all. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe are pranksters when they're together. Usually Ratchet and Prowl are their favorite targets. Although Ironhide and even Optimus aren't exactly safe from them either."

Epps gaped. "Sideswipe being mischievous? I don't believe it! The first time I met him, he was rather cold, it wasn't until we got to the training sessions that he started to warm up a little."

Jazz pause and sighed. "Being cold isn't really Sideswipe's thing; it was more of his twin's. I suppose it was his way of filling in for him."

"So Sunstreaker is cold-hearted?"

The lieutenant of the Autobots sighed again. "Hmm, from an objective point of view, he stands in the 'gray area' for the Autobots."

Epps frowned at it, "Gray area?"

"He's an extremely prideful bot, takes a lot of convincing that something is worth it in his optics, and is a very accomplished and skilled warrior, even more so than his brother, but at times he can't control his 'bloodlust' as you humans say it." Jazz said uneasily. "Doesn't think twice about killing or taking down another bot's life when it comes to the enemy. Some of the other Autobots actually question if he should be an Autobot since those traits are more like a Decepticon."

That description made Epps froze.

Jazz went on. "As you probably guessed since Sideswipe is an Autobot, Optimus has always accepted Sunstreaker as an Autobot."

"Why?"

"Because Sunny chose to be one for his brother. He never would say it aloud, but he wanted the best for Sides," Jazz replied in a sad tone in his voice. "Both Sunny and Sides were young when the war started, about 'teenagers' I suppose in your human age class. Even if they were programmed to be warrior bots, it doesn't mean they did not like the time of peace. The first time we found them, they were both in a wreck. There were no other survivors from the city they lived in. You can possibly guess how Sunny feels about Sides."

Epps nodded in understanding, "He would do anything to protect his only remaining family at all costs, even if it means being called a ruthless killer."

"Yup. Eventually the other bots accepted him, since together with his twin, they could take out more 'Cons than the others," Jazz said. "Because the bond connection in their spark was special in a way that they could work simultaneously just by thought."

"Telepathically?"

"Yeah, that's what humans call it. The 'Cons feared them when they were both around."

Sergeant Epps had been overwhelmed at first when he saw the skills Sideswipe had during training, and he couldn't imagine what it would be like if he was reunited with this twin, Sunstreaker. There probably would be a drastic decrease in the Decepticon population on Earth.

"Say, where was Sideswipe when he sent the last transmission?" Epps questioned.

"His last report said he was following an underground crime syndicate in Kansas City," Jazz said.

The Sergeant looked at the dashboard with a troubled look.

_That didn't sound so good._

He only prayed that everything would go smoothly for Sideswipe.

* * *

_Hours later in Springfield, Missouri, US…_

A red Toyota Camry was parked in the garage.

It was probably the first time ever he had gotten into the color of his brother, which was red. He probably wouldn't have even thought of using red in his lifetime if he wasn't a part of the whole mess because of Soundwave. On a brighter note, he was finally going to get his hands on the 'Con that left him in a heap of dirt and humility. He found the human's plans to be very innovative and almost alarmingly well thought out. Not only had Skyler devised a plan B, but he had about five different variations of plans if things went messy. Also, thanks to Sunstreaker, his plans were foolproof in terms of the exit strategy. All Sunny had to do now was to rest in his alt-form, as he would need all the energy to take that 'Con down later on.

What could have taken a three to four hour drive was broken in record time by two and a half hours.

_So the human freaked out with his more insane maneuvering._

Skyler swore that if they were traveling like that again, he wasn't going to have breakfast before, or lunch for that matter.

He listened somewhat half-heartedly to the discussion of the two humans in front of him as they were doodling on the map with ways to get to the junkyard. Yes, he was excited about getting to kill a 'Con. What made him curious to hear of the discussion was the voice of the fleshling by the name of Yao Phing.

"So how many minutes do we have exactly to get through all those traffic lights?" Skyler asked.

"Hmm,-three-and-a-half-minutes. If-you're-lucky-four, if-I-get-caught-in-the-traffic-management-system-office-first,-two-and-a-half." Phing said in one breath.

_Primus! A HUMAN replica of BLURR!_

_If anyone _   
_says_   
_ it 'is a small universe after all', I'm going to shoot 'em!_

Blurr was the fastest of all the Autobots, which was very fitting for his name. The bad part was that talking to him was a problem. He was so fast that many found it hard to even know what he was talking about. For some odd reason, Optimus Prime had managed learn how to.

It was a shame he couldn't do anything about this human in front of him. All he could do now was endure. Sunstreaker was surprised at how Skyler caught the other's words without much effort. He predicted that maybe Skyler got used to it when they used to learn together.

From what Sunstreaker had seen, it was true in a sense how Yao Phing or 'Phing' was ethnically different from Skyler, even if he was human. Well, first was how the name was being ordered, as the Chinese had their family name first. Skin-wise he was tan to pale white and his eyes were sharp. Very different from Skyler's Uncle Franz, who was a total opposite of Skyler. He remembered the human used the term 'Asian'.

Phing wasn't all that tall, notably his height only reached Skyler's ear, had jet black short-cut hair, brown eyes, and was very thin and scrawny looking.

Sunstreaker may have had his doubts about other things, but he had definitely learned that whoever Skyler found worth working with, they had their own special thing. All talents lie within, so he was good to go in working with another human for the time being, even if the human was not aware of him.

Soon, the plans were fully mapped up on the planning board. Phing was jumping up and down as he caught the envelope that was thick with money in it from Skyler's throw, and both then shook hands which ended up as a hug.

"Thank-you-so-much! I-really-owe-you-for-this! My-mother-needs-it-for-her-medicine!"

"Anytime, send my get well soon to Aunt Mei, alright?" Skyler smiled. "You need it. I've still got another savings account Uncle Neil gave me. I just need to get this job done on the bus driver."

There was a look of determination in Phing's eyes. "This-is-for-Steve, right? I-won't-let-you-down! Leave-it-to-me!"

Skyler waved him out as he exited the garage door onto the street to get everything he had to do ready for tonight.

"So that's why you paid him," Sunstreaker concluded.

"Yeah, his mother is sick at the moment. He didn't have the right amount of money to cover her operation. So I added on what's left," Skyler said.

Sunny chuckled, "I didn't take you for a sentimental person, Skyler."

The young con man shrugged. "The world of Grifters is gray, Sunstreaker. Some are ruthless, but there are still some who are considered as the honest con men. The only thing in common is that no con man is sentimental about it when it comes to the mark. A mark is a mark, and the target is chosen because we despise them."

"And that would make your con men family classified as the 'honest con men'." Sunstreaker stated. He snorted, "You and your morals, human. It's mind bending. It's like a war."

"Well, you heard the plans. I need to get my part started." The young man said as he took a wig and a beard plus mustache and put them on. "I'm going to walk over to the local supermarket that's just about two blocks away to get some supplies and a snack. How far do your scanners range up to?"

"About radius of a mile or two," Sunstreaker said. "I'll keep them on in case the 'Con makes an appearance."

"Right, I'll be back soon," Skyler said as he added in sunglasses and a black cap on his head. "Rest easy, we're up for a hunt tonight."

And with that, Skyler walked out of the garage, closing the door on his way and making sure it was locked.

It didn't take him long to reach the supermarket, a small version of Wal-Mart that was nearer the apartment blocks. Once he got inside, he looked at the rather tediously long list of what he needed. He took out a shopping cart and started looking for all the items he needed. As he located each item he needed, he put it in the cart and ticked it off the list. Item after item that he could find there went into the shopping cart, the ones he could not find ended up being circled. _I'm gonna have to check some stores that are near here if I need to get those. _The con man then went to the cashier to pay for his things.

The clerk somewhat commented on his shopping, "Having a party with all the balloons, sir?"

"Yeah, party for my son," Skyler said proudly as he played along. "His sixth birthday, it's an army theme."

A smile from the clerk and he paid for his things with cash.

"A Happy Birthday to your son then, sir. Hope to see you again and that you enjoyed your shopping here," the clerk said politely.

Skyler gruffly nodded at that and exited the supermarket.

_The things he had to do as a con man._

He sighed as he needed to complete his shopping first and head over the junkyard for the preparations. So ok, he lied to Sunstreaker about not heading straight back to where Phing was staying. Yet, he couldn't help but make sure that everything had to be perfect for tonight. It was a matter of life and death. If anything, he wanted to make sure that Sunstreaker came out on top after battling Dreadnought. Skyler was getting closer to where his brother was and any failure in getting the Decepticon tonight was more of a risk to Steve.

_It had to be a sure bet._

He pulled out his cell phone and called the telephone operator for local area, "Hello? Yes. Would there happen to be a container transporter in the area?"

There were questions on specific things over the line.

"Preferably for moving large cargo. You know, those containers that are pulled by semi-trucks," Skyler described. And as the numbers were called out, he jotted them on his hand with a pen. "Thank you."

Skyler then make a quick call to the indicated number.

"Hello, is this Mr. Brandy?" Skyler asked. "I'd like to hire a service for your container and semi-trucks."

* * *

_Much later on…_

Again now that Sunstreaker accepted it as a routine, it was him in alt-mode and the human doing his thing in the garage.

Phing was still out getting his things or doing whatever he was.

Skyler had arrived later than he said but only mentioned that he needed to negotiate the transport of getting the crime scene cleaned up. The human was now preparing the cartridges to his M110 SASS, he decided that this time he wasn't going to take any chances he filled it up with 2 bullets that exploded once it was embedded into the target, and it was followed up by a flare cartridge. It meant he had two chances of hitting the 'Con and he would use the flare to relocate and filled in the clip in that pattern. He also made sure that the night vision scope was functioning properly.

"Well, we've got everything we need," Skyler said satisfied. "All we need is to wait for Phing to finish off his work. Anything you're not sure of before we get to the hunt?"

Remembering something they said that intrigued the bot, he said, "Nothing related to our mission, but you were talking about someone with him, someone called the 'Ghost' doing the flop. Who's the ghost and what's a flop?"

"The 'Ghost' is a friend of ours; he's older than me and Phing. His real name Keith Cooper, he got his nickname since he does the best exit strategies. Even if you chase him he disappears into nothing, like a ghost," Skyler laughed. "I really couldn't believe he did the 'flop' though."

"Just what is a 'flop'?" Sunstreaker asked, confused because the vocabulary data he had stated it meant something that related to epic failure or falling down with a sudden thud.

Skyler happily explained it to the Autobot. "It's a classic Con. It's called a 'Flop', as in 'falling down suddenly'. So basically you do an act of falling down. For example you have an old injury, say a skull fracture. You re-enact the accident that would lead to that fracture, like going to a street where the cars aren't too fast but fast enough to turn you over a bit."

He continued. "Then prepare some chicken blood in a small plastic bag. Step in front of the speeding car, you 'flop' yourself onto the car that's supposedly 'hitting' you. So while you're doing that, you burst the chicken blood plastic bag over yourself where you got hit so it looks like an accident. Preferably you get a minor wound if it's possible in the process too. Then, you claim the injury is new from the accident, and you get paid by the health insurance company. Risky, but worth it if you don't mind getting into hospital."

"You humans are mad. You could get killed just because you wanted to get the health insurance to pay you." Sunstreaker scoffed at the classic con. "I suppose if your 'ghost' friend can run away easily later then it's not a problem for him."

Skyler laughed. "Well they're classics, done in the 1910s to the early 1920s. Con artists rarely do most of them now days, though some are perfected and preserved. A 'flop' is beneficial as long as you can do it properly. If you don't the risks of getting long term health damage is big."

"Would you consider doing it?"

"Not in a lifetime," Skyler said defensively. "I hate hospitals, especially the smell."

Sunstreaker found it ironic how he never liked getting into the med bay as well.

* * *

It was boring.

Nothing to do but wait.

He hated waiting for too long.

Sideswipe sighed. So far there hadn't been any other activity where he was parked at. The apartment building next to him seemed to be some sort of base for operations, but he knew it was not the main base. Perhaps some sort of command center? Most likely, he did see the boss of those humans coming in with some bodyguards. It was most likely that they were up to something inside, but so far there wasn't really any more activity besides the goons going out and about.

The warrior bot had a feeling that if the kidnapping really did have anything to do with the hackers, he would have to wait until the boss made his move exiting the building. It was a natural thing for the boss to actually see the development of the hackers himself. Still, when was the stupid human boss going to come out?

Sides was rather irked, because he was bored _and _alone.

At least when he was with Sunny he had someone to talk to when it came to boring recons.

The Autobot briefly scanned again, in case there was any not-so-ordinary activity in the building.

Plus it was approaching sunset.

He was hoping at least something exciting might happen tonight, even though he was doubtful about it.

Seeing as there was nothing to do, with curiosity he tried calling out to his brother through the bond. Like usual, it was closed off. There was only a dull echo that came back. Sideswipe wondered at the time how he was able to reconnect with his brother for that brief moment. It was clear that his elder twin was alive somewhere out there. But where was he? Ratchet would not allow him to reconnect to Sunny, saying that it also affected his own spark.

Again, Sideswipe was weighing the choices. What if he somehow managed to reach to his twin? At least he could 'feel' where his twin was and somehow get to him. Even if Sunny was in space, that meant he was near the solar system of Earth. Without much thinking, he made a push through the bond.

There was pain, but he somehow felt Sunny's feelings! He was calm, resting somewhere.

Wanting to know more this time, he pushed even harder into the bond to the point the pain was excruciating.

_Gah, slag it, Sunny! Let me in! Let me in!_

But the bond was still closed off.

Sideswipe pushed even harder with all he could, even as his vision started to darken…

* * *

_Meanwhile on the other side of the road at the same moment…_

"That Stingray concept has been here since yesterday," one organization member said. "No driver in sight."

The other looked worried, "Must've followed us yesterday from the coffee store. We should've kept quiet."

"It's not like the guy was a cop or something."

"What are we going to do?" the newer member asked.

"Take the spy's car. I haven't seen the driver all day and he'll probably come back for it at night," his partner said. "That car probably could be some use to us; even the boss might like it. Let's take our chance and tow it in."

There was still concern in the other's face, "And tow it where?"

He whacked the junior member behind the head, "The _main base,_ dumb a**, where else?

"Oh," the other said sheepishly.

"Get the other guys, newcomer, that car is ours for the taking."

 

* * *

  
"So are you nervous for your first big job?" Skyler asked his cousin over the phone about the long con they were doing. "It's been a while you know, especially since you're going in with Keith."

 

"A bit, but I'm excited, really," said a female voice. "Keith said he wants to see you afterward. I think he may want you in our group."

"Sorry Rachel, not till I find my bro. No offense."

Rachel sighed. "Well, you'll have to tell him that yourself. I know you don't want your twin to miss all the fun. That's the reason why you're heading to Kansas City tomorrow right?"

"Yeah," Skyler replied. He quickly changed the subject. "How are your parents by the way? Uncle James and Aunt Veronica still out of the country?"

There was a pause over the phone. "Well, Sky, you know their 'work'. They said they were in London."

Skyler translated that they were both on a long con themselves. It wasn't really surprising for con family members to do their own things with different groups, but it all in the end linked up to the 'Caldwell' con family. Uncle Robert was the eldest son from his father's side of the family, which was followed by Aunt Veronica and finally his dad who was the youngest. So he had a few cousins. Linus (31) being the oldest and only child to Uncle Robert, Tim (27) and Rachel (25) were from Aunt Veronica. Since Rachel was by herself, Tim was most likely back in California somewhere.

"Tim's back at home by himself, then?"

"Yeah, probably has some girls staying over at our place," Rachel joked. "My brother's a real womanizer."

"No kidding," Skyler laughed.

Rachel's voice turned to a rush, "Oh, hey, Sky? I gotta go. Everyone's heading to rendezvous point right now."

"I see. Good luck on the job. Enjoy it," Skyler said. "I'll meet you and the guys later on."

"Meet you soon, Sky."

The telephone line was hung up.

Skyler was just about to get back to eating his snack when there was a piercing sound that made him cover his ears.

A sound of a shelf falling with its contents was heard from the garage.

"What the f****** hell?" the young man swore. Then he recognized the sound. It was like when he was on the road to Memphis.

"Shit. Sunstreaker…"

He wasted no time as he ran downstairs to the garage, knowing something must have happened to the Autobot.

* * *

_That idiotic glitch!_

Sunstreaker forced himself to make sure the bond was shut. There was a sudden burst of energy flowing through him which had made him move from his position to the left of the wall violently causing a couple of small shelves to fall over.

Skyler came into the room looking shocked. "Sunstreaker! Are you alright?"

"Pit NO! Stupid… Sides… the fragger…" The car moved and heaved. "…pushed… into the bond."

Frightened and not really knowing what to do to ease the bot's pain, Skyler's head snapped around looking for what can help to keep the Autobot's alt-form still. He found them quickly. The young man knew it was a stupid thing to do, but quickly set the concrete mobile car barrier slabs under Sunstreaker's back wheels, and afterward held with his arms wide out to one side of the car near the door in hopes that the bot would stop moving too much.

_At least it managed_   
_ to stop from Sunstreaker from crashing _   
_against the back wall_   
_._

Yet the pained spasm from the Autobot kept going and at times Skyler had to use all of his own strength just to stand firm holding onto Sunstreaker.

He was lucky enough no to get flicked away like a fly.

"Easy, Sunstreaker!" Skyler said, still holding on, staying as calm as he could even though his heart was jumping up and down all over the place. "You have to focus to close the bond now! You hear me?"

"FRAG IT, HUMAN! I'VE ALREADY TRIED! JUST …GET OFF OF ME!" Sunstreaker roared.

"NO!" the human cried out. "FOCUS, SUNSTREAKER! YOU **CAN** SHUT IT OFF!

"IT'S NOT WORKING!" the Autobot retorted.

Skyler was on the last straw, "DAMN IT, MECH! HOW DO YOU THINK THIS IS AFFECTING SIDESWIPE? JUST DO IT!

With his twin's life on his mind, Sunstreaker drove himself to close off the bond. It took another two minutes before Sunny was successful in closing the bond off, but he was grateful that he had managed to do it while still keeping conscious. Last time, he actually fainted in the middle of nowhere. His spark was still humming rapidly, but it soon started to stabilize itself. The young man had not let go at all until he was sure the bot wasn't moving violently again.

"Ugh…ack…. Slag it…" Sunstreaker groaned in pain. This was the first time he'd been in alt-form while in this state.

"How are your systems doing?" Skyler stood, worry written all over his face. "If we can't make it tonight, we'll postpone it for tomorrow."

"It's fine, human." Sunstreaker struggled. "We're hunting tonight."

"But your condition-"

"You won't get another chance like this, Skyler," Sunstreaker said stubbornly. "Keep to the plan."

Skyler knew it was their only chance of doing it was tonight, but was it worth Sunstreaker's life? No. He wouldn't risk anyone's life on the job. The bot had just suffered through what was probably the equivalent of a human stroke and he was still going out on the hunt? The bot was insane!

_What if Sunstreaker gets affected _   
_by_   
_ what just happened _   
_during_   
_ the hunt?_

_Dreadnought could kill him._

However, Skyler reminded himself that Sunstreaker was a soldier, and he wanted to do this. He couldn't possibly keep delaying on getting to Steve either. There was no backing down; the only thing that Skyler could do was to make sure everything was the bare minimum when it came to damage control. The young man was glad at times like this that he had prepared a plan Gs to Zs if sketchy things happened.

The young sighed in defeat. "If that's your wish, but promise me one thing."

"What's that?" Sunny asked tiredly, surprised the human was not telling him off about his current health state.

"It's a con family saying, Sunstreaker," Skyler said with conviction. "Just because we do the things we do or need to do, it doesn't mean you need to do things alone or be alone. We're in it together; share the pain when you need to. You don't have to bear it alone." He paused making sure the bot could have some time to think on it and hear it clearly. "Tell me when you want to, if anything is wrong, alright? I'm here with an open mind."

Sunstreaker ended up being speechless.

It was as if a part of the pressure he was holding onto for so long was let out.

_A human reaching out to his spark?_

_Just how do humans do that?_

Even if he didn't know the answer, he was glad for it.

"I'll try. But I can't promise you anything." Sunstreaker said briefly. "… Thank you, Skyler."

"You're welcome, Sunstreaker," Skyler answered back as he gave a fond pat on the hood of the car. "Rest up, ok? You'll have to be in a good condition to fight Dreadnought. I can't start the hunt without you and we're going to need all the firepower we can get, so recharge. I'll wake you an hour and a half before we start the hunt."

"Right," Sunstreaker replied before shutting his systems down to recharge.

Skyler heaved out a sigh now that the whole thing was over. If this was affecting Sunstreaker pretty badly, he was sure it must have affected his twin just the same if not worse. He only hoped wherever the other Autobot twin was he was safe from the Decepticons. The garage was quiet again as it was over.

The young man looked to his watch seeing as everything would start in three to four hours. Hopefully it was enough for Sunstreaker to rest.

He hurriedly started cleaning up the garage before Phing came back.

* * *

_At Night in one of Springfield' streets…_

-( This is 'snake theta' in position with the yellow Lambo, over. )- Skyler voiced into the mouth piece.

He heard Phing's voice in return, -( 'Eagle eyes', here. Read you and see you loud and clear. Nice steal bro, over. )-

Skyler rolled his eyes, -( Just keep an eye out for us and the others alright? Over. )-

So, it was a crazy thing to do.

The fact that tonight was a combination of an annual auction transaction con with a Decepticon hunt.

Skyler was not at first in agreement with Phing, but somehow there was always a good reason when it came to helping 'family' when they were doing Cons. To Skyler's surprise that afternoon when he arrived, his cousin Rachel was in town with Keith's con man group. Phing was around to help them in the exit strategy plans in getting all their client's winnings out, but they lacked a good distraction that would mess up the traffic. Considering all Phing knew that Skyler had some sort of 'lunatic bus driver' on his tail, they all agreed that during the exit plan Skyler would drive through the area and cause a larger chaos and lead the 'lunatic' to the junkyard.

Not that Skyler was complaining, as he was getting paid for it.

As long as he didn't end up dead.

He'd just have to make sure that Dreadnought kept following him, while Phing rigged the whole traffic system and feeding false surveillance to the security and the police. So far things were going well.

Dreadnought, of course, was already here where they were. The moment he managed to spot Sunstreaker's supposed to be yellow form (Lamborghini Superleggera); he kept on circling the same roads over and over checking if it was the bot by sending out insults (not easily heard to the human ear and in Cybertronian). The 'Con wasn't sure yet whether it was really Sunny or not as there was a human inside. Thankfully Sunstreaker hadn't yet taken them in or even replied to the bot yet as it would blow their cover.

"Are your friends done yet?" Sunstreaker impatiently said. "Stupid fragger is getting on my nerves."

Skyler looked to his watch, "It should be over now, Sunstreaker." He fastened his seat belts. "The commands should come about now. So get your insults ready."

"Heh, I'm more than ready," Sunstreaker sneered. "Glad your friend isn't speaking 'rapid' language again."

The young man laughed, "Don't worry, mech. He only talks fast when he's excited."

-( 'Snake theta' your on the roll! Head towards the four way junction, we're starting the chaos! )- Phing called out. –( Keep Mr. Lunatic on your tail. )-

-( Gotcha, 'snake theta' moving out. )- Skyler replied.

On cue, Sunstreaker got out of the parking space and moved in closer to the bus that was Dreadnought.

"What's a matter rusty coward glitching drone 'Con?" Sunstreaker taunted. "Poor thing, he doesn't have even circuits to fry in his processor."

"YOU!" Dreadnought gasped that it was in fact the Autobot he'd been looking for. "Autobot Scum!"

"Come on fragger 'aft! If you really want to kill me, you got to catch me!"

And the chase was on.

Skyler let all of the controls of the car go to Sunstreaker who was better off controlling his own body. It was a car styled roller coaster ride from hell, and he probably wouldn't be surprised if he did get a heart attack from the amount of adrenaline that went through him, just from two close swerves at the first two four-way intersections. Dreadnought had gotten pounded by other cars thanks to Phing.

-( Err, Snake? )- Phing asked uncertainly.

-( What is now? )- He said slightly annoyed as he was till keeping his eyes on Dreadnought and on the road making sure Sunstreaker didn't overdo it.

-( The _mark_ blocked the road! Three cop cars are there guarding the road exit! They're not letting any cars out of the road intersection to the auction place! )-

-( WHAT? )- Skyler shouted. –( Why did you just tell me now? Ok, ok, ok, just- is there anywhere I can get the lunatic driver in and do damage?)-

_Calm down Skyler, calm down._

-( Umm- Uh- Oh!)-

Skyler knew that his 'eye in the sky' spotted something. –( Tell me what to do now, I don't care what it is. I'm not letting 'Vixen' (Rachel) get caught in the crap 'Snapper' (Keith) thought up without a real good exit plan that's for _everyone_! )-

-( Snapper's gotten a ramp to be in place at minute 3:00 from a X-Game just two blocks away in front of the blockade. Think you can jump? If Mr. Lunatic does the jump too we can get everyone out. )-

Skyler seriously wanted to punch Keith in the face.

_Just GREAT._

_He was going have to do the James Bond Jump._

_James Bond Jump: Agent 007 plus his awesome cool car doing the 'cinematic' jump._

_Well, Sunstreaker had to._

"Sunstreaker, you heard that?" Skyler quickly asked knowing the clock was ticking. Hesitantly he said, "Up for it?"

The bot snorted, "Are you insulting my skills?"

Sklyer paled in terror.

_CRAP._

_It was now or never._

_Oh, God. Help me get through this!_

He replied to Phing, -( I'm going for the jump, Eagle Eyes. Say to Snapper I'm requesting triple the payment. He's got no say on it. )-

Skyler looked at his watch again and it was already at 2.30 minutes.

"Sunstreaker, we got thirty seconds!"

"On it!"

The con man looked behind and still saw that the 'Con was still hot on their trail. It now all depended on Sunstreaker making sure of getting there on time and Dreadnought following him. Skyler wasn't sure what Sunstreaker was saying in Cybertronian, but it was probably the best kind of insult that kept the Decepticon glued and hell bent on chasing the Autobot. After what Skyler had thought to be the scariest swerve of the road that missed another car by inches, he finally saw the ramp.

Skyler gulped.

_Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!_

Sunstreaker seeing this, his speedometer went from 75 km per second to nearly 250 km in barely four seconds, something that even a normal race car could not do. Dreadnought surprisingly had followed suit.

The police on the other side started shouting to everyone that was there, "GET OUT OF THE WAY! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

Sunstreaker drove on to the ramp and jumped.

He soared through the air and he was laughing raucously while the poor human inside him yelled out in terror while hanging on for his dear life.

The Autobot landed with a nice turn on the road and a proudly proclaimed, "Damn, I'm good!"

Skyler could only laugh in victory as they got over the whole blockade without a dent. "Yeah! You did it! Woohoo! Yeah!"

However, Dreadnought, being heavier than Sunstreaker, only made it a quarter of the way over, crashing, and tumbling through the police cars and destroying the blockade itself. Amazingly, even through all of that he was back on his wheels. At least the damage was done.

-( Awesome, Snake! You were incredible! )- Phing shouted happily. –( Everyone's getting out of there! )-

-( GOD, that was EXTREME! Don't _ever_ ask me to do it again! )- Skyler breathed out. –( Help me get to the junkyard by making sure no traffic leads there, Eagle eyes. )-

-(Gotcha covered, Snake. You got a minute before my time is out and the surveillance cops start detecting me.)-

Skyler understood that afterward he was on his own. –( Do what you do best. )-

Skyler watched the changes in the traffic lights as the traffic lights were somehow diverting the other cars or vehicles out of the way. There were no police cars in sight or at all. He was really thankful that Phing had sent them somewhere else on a false report or something of the kind. Sunstreaker had managed to evade the large 'Con so far. It was soon going to be the grand finale. Skyler couldn't help but feel tense.

-( Hey, Snake. This is where we part. Give the 'lunatic' hell, buddy. Be careful and good luck! )- Phing said, getting ready to log out.

-( Thanks, eagle eye. See you in a few hours. )- Skyler replied, ending the last transmission.

"Looks like we're on our own for this one," the young con man sighed.

Sunstreaker was sure of that as well. "You're right. Skyler?"

"What?"

"Don't get yourself killed," Sunstreaker said in a serious tone. "I really don't want to kidnap another human. The next human might drive me insane."

Skyler couldn't help snicker at it, "I thought I already drove you insane."

"You're fine, human," the bot said truthfully. "I don't think I'll ever meet or find a human quite like you again."

"I'll do what I can to stay alive. Make sure you don't go down on me in this one, mech," Skyler said back. "After we get Steve, I want to see you reunited with Sideswipe."

"It'll take more than that Dreadnought to kill me," Sunstreaker said. "Let's do this for our twins then."

They soon arrived near the junkyard, Sunstreaker came to a halt as Skyler hopped out quickly with his bag in an all black burglar suit with a black face cover over his face and made a run for the junkyard through a shortcut between a few buildings. Sunstreaker immediately left and took Dreadnought on another way of the road there. He would have to give the human some time to prepare. Good thing the 'Con was pretty consistent in chasing him around all over the place - it didn't seem like he was going to give up soon. So he did a couple of chases between a few blocks and even played a Cybertronian version of 'you're it' with Dreadnought. As long as he could heat up his opponent the better chance his attack later on would be uncoordinated.

_Hopefully the human would be ready soon._

Back at the Junkyard, Skyler put together his semi-automatic sniper rifle with a sound suppressor. He was lying on the top of the roof flat on his belly and focusing the scope which had night-vision on an 'X' mark on the ground where Sunstreaker would be fighting the large Decepticon. Then he took out three small remote controls. He looked at them hoping he wouldn't have to resort to them. He breathed out a tense breath while preparing for the kill. Skyler never really wanted to kill anyone, but this was a kill to survive. It was either the 'Con or Sunstreaker. He steeled himself with the rule to a con man about the mark. There's never sympathy when it comes to the mark, and his role for now was the sniper.

The sniper now laid down waiting with tense anticipation as he heard the sounds of engines coming in.

Sunstreaker now was finally heading into the junkyard through the large doorway but he made sure that Dreadnought was a good distance away from him, and transformed into bi-pedal mode, unsheathing his double blades. He smiled when Dreadnought came through the doorway and snapped a thin fishing wire. There was a satisfying 'boom'.

It was clear that Skyler had booby-trapped the place.

The 'Con growled as he soon too shifted and turned, showing his true mech form. As soon as he was up, he lunged at the smaller Autobot. It was now a clash of titans. Blows were exchanged, counter-attacks were made, and the resonating sound of clanging metal went through the junkyard with thunderous echoes. Sunstreaker was glad that Dreadnought's blows had become sluggish as he was tired and injured from the previous run-about through the human city and the recently triggered explosive. His armor was starting to wear down in the chest-plate area from the use of his double blades. Sunstreaker now made sure that Dreadnought was facing where he hoped to be and standing on the marked 'X' spot.

Skyler, who knew this was his chance, re-focused as quickly as he could to the area just behind the knee-cap area and made a shot.

The bullet latched onto the leg and made a beeping noise.

The warrior Autobot heard this, took his cue and skated away with his wheeled legs just far enough to get out of the way but close enough that he could make another strike. The effect was surprising in what the tiny little bullet could do.

Dreadnought was now balancing on one leg.

"Argh! You stupid Autoscums! Working with weak fleshlings!" Dreadnought shouted in outraged agony. He managed to look at where the shot came and spotted smoke from what seemed to be a gun and a small figure. "A fleshling!"

Sunstreaker felt dread in his spark. "No!"

But it was too late, the shot was fired from one of Dreadnought's plasma guns before the 'Con was tackled to the ground.

The Autobot warrior didn't have time to check and see if the human was still alive. Rage filled his spark, and he struck the same spot of armor leading to the spark chamber. He'd have to kill the stupid Decepticon first! He was nearly there…just two more layers and …

'**WHACK!'**

A surprise attack came crashing into him and as he flew over to the other side of the junkyard. He groaned in pain upon impact. Dreadnought was crawling on one leg but his big arms were still functional and being bulked up in transformation, they looked and felt like sledgehammers. Sunstreaker struggled to get up but he his body wasn't responding the way he wanted it to. The warrior soon realized that he was still weak from the pain spasms he'd suffered earlier that day.

_Slag it._

_Come on, come on, COME ON!_

_Move, move, MOVE!_

Balancing on one leg and an arm Dreadnought used his free arm to attack the Autobot. He heaved the heavy hammer weapon in the air.

Sunstreaker winced as he knew he couldn't move at all. He braced for impact…

'_**BEEP!'**_

'_**BOOM!'**_

Instead, the attacking arm now fell off from Dreadnought's shoulder as he howled in pain. Again, with desperation, the Con looked for a source of smoke from a gun or any sort of weapon. No sooner had he activated his scanners, then he detected smoke from the other side with a small figure there that had a gun. "Frag you stupid, fleshling! Stay dead!" With the remaining shot he fired a larger burst this time.

But luck was not on his side.

This was retaliated with a flare bullet to his optics, making him blind.

This made Sunstreaker's spirits lift because Skyler was somehow still alive.

Finally finding that his body was responding and given an opportunity by the shot that rendered his opponent blind, Sunstreaker used his blades to amputate the Decepticon's remaining arm from his shoulder and cut it in half so he couldn't use it. The warrior simply stabbed his other arm until it wasn't working anymore.

"Scream all you want, Con," Sunstreaker said victoriously. "You're as good as offlined anyway."

Dreadnought growled, "You got help from a fleshling."

"It's not like anyone is going to know about that, 'Con," Sunstreaker shrugged. "Not to mention, don't you feel ashamed that your limbs got blown off by something so puny? You're lucky you didn't get killed by one. Then, you'd probably die in shame."

Sunstreaker cut off the remaining armor that covered the spark chamber. He took it out for his opponent to see, and as fear gripped Dreadnought's optics, he squeezed his hand shut, crushing the spark and sealing his enemy's fate.

Dreadnought was finally dead.

The battle was over.

"You can come out, Skyler!" Sunstreaker shouted.

From his hiding place Skyler jogged over, pulling off his mask. "Mission Success!"

"I thought you were turned into organic muck and bits!" Sunstreaker scolded the small human. "Primus, don't give me a spark shock again!"

Skyler sheepishly scratched his head. "I could have been. Sorry, I scared you."

"How about an explanation?" Sunny asked, still confused how a human could avoid a plasma shot so quickly. "It's obvious you planned it without telling me."

The young man went back to his hiding spot and dragged out something.

"A dud?" The bot raised an optic brow.

"Yeah," Skyler said proudly. "It fooled the 'Con good. It's really simple to make. I bought some army clothes, and toy sniper guns that are similar in size. I thought of using a real sized mannequin but it was too tedious. So, I filled in the body parts with different shaped balloons in order to simulate a human body. Then I planted a small mini smoke release in the gun to make it look like it was shooting when I hit the remote button. I was somewhere else in the area, and the distraction gave me time to relocate. Since it's dark and he was battling you, he didn't get a chance to check if it was a real human or not. It's a mind trick."

The Autobot was blinked.

_Ingenious._

_A true mind manipulator till the end._

Sunstreaker shook his head with a sigh and pointed down at the human. "NEXT TIME you will TELL ME."

"Alright, agreed," Skyler gave up. "I was worried when you got the seizure that there might be aftereffects, so I thought I should make some back up plans."

"You could have told me."

"Not when you were resting, Sunstreaker," Skyler said. "I don't take risks with people's lives after I get to know them. A con is a sure bet and I intend to keep it that way when someone's life is at stake."

Although Skyler did not say it directly, the Autobot already translated his true intentions that he was prepared to save the lives the people he knew of without a doubt. On the inside, Sunstreaker was proud that the human counted him as partner, perhaps a friend or a brother. He wasn't sure which one, but this battle proved that the human he was traveling with had his own worth.

They piled the remains in a container attached to a semi-truck that was parked not too far away. With everything in place and the container was sealed, Skyler called in the truck driver from the transport company and had it sent to a storage container facility in Nevada. It didn't seem that money was an issue for Skyler as he seemed to get it easily wherever he went through cons.

The drive back to Phing's place wasn't very eventful, only the discussion on how finally their first hunt was over in their favor.

"Expecting payment when you get back?" Sunstreaker asked.

"Yup, I'm not expecting much, but a nice organic food breakfast would be good," Skyler shared his thoughts. "You should get a good car wash and wax in the morning as well. How about it?"

"Sounds good to me for the wash and wax," Sunstreaker said satisfied. "Ugh, organics have 'organic' food?"

"It's healthy," Skyler said matter-of-factly. "I can't keep gobbling down junk food."

"Well, 'junk' food sounds reasonable to me," the bot said. "Sounds better than 'organic'."

Skyler laughed, "Are we having a debate about this? Seriously, things that are organic are healthier for humans. Junk food tends to come with long term diseases if you each too much of them."

Sunstreaker was confused. "So why do you eat them?"

"Because they're cheap and you can easily get them. Another name for them is 'fast food'. Organic food costs more and usually takes longer to cook," Skyler explained. "Let's leave it at that."

Feeling a need to push the conversation to another topic, Sunstreaker asked, "So your cousin will be at Phing's place?"

"Yeah, and Keith and his group are there too," Skyler answered and smiled as his mind wondered off. "It'll be pretty interesting to meet the others."

Sunstreaker knew that smile. "You're planning something."

"Come on, Sunstreaker. Cut me some slack, ok?" Skyler pouted. "Are you scanning me again?"

The Autobot didn't answer the question. "Spill the details, human."

"Just having a grudge on Keith, that's all," the young man said without any clues.

Trying to prod for more clues, the Autobot asked, "Plan of revenge?"

"Poker," Skyler said, still smiling.

Sunstreaker checked his database from what he got from the human. The result he came out with was a card game played by two or more people, in whom the players bet on the value of their hands, the winner taking the pool.

"Mind tricks, human?" Sunstreaker asked.

"Yup."

"Sneaky as ever," the bot commented as he laughed. "I'd like to see how you play."

"Don't worry, mech. If I get the real goods, you're having a first class wash and wax tomorrow morning and I'll drop by the hotel restaurant for a good healthy breakfast," Skyler smiled confidently.

Sunstreaker was not going to complain about that, it was a good reward after the whole mess they went through.

He might as well enjoy it while he could as chaos would probably turn up soon.

But for now he focused on the road back to something that intrigued him.

The 'con man family' or 'grifter family'.

The Autobot was curious how these family groups worked.

It was going to be fascinating to see what they were like.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 2.03: Satisfaction._

_Planet Earth, Springfield, Missouri, US._

_So, our first day of travel was probably the weirdest experience that I ever had. We traveled from Memphis to Jonesborough, and then to Springfield in one day. And in this town, I met a human replica of Blurr named Yao Phing. Thankfully, he's not a joke with his hacking skills _   
_and_   
_ helped me get through the traffic for my kill. In a sense it was ironic that the chase I went through was helping Skyler's cousin band of grifters,_   
_ too_   
_. Time went by so fast I didn't even realize that Dreadnought was already dead and I had killed the fragger for good after all the fuss he put me through._

_FINALLY!_

_OFFLINED!_

_I didn't have to worry about him following me anymore, and that meant we were for now safe from Soundwave. No one would expect that I killed him as his remains were contained in a large metallic container that Skyler requested _   
_to_   
_ be driven off to Nevada's container storage grounds. So our first kill turned out quiet as we planned._

_It was _   
_a definite_   
_ victory over the Decepticons, but it was just the first one. The challenges ahead of fighting 'Cons that had communication systems that were online was another level we'd probably face soon. It meant I'd probably have to work with Skyler _   
_more_   
_ and think of better plans to put them down. This 'Con was a stupid one, I only hoped we didn't get into trouble with any of the larger 'Cons like Megatron or Screamer. In my condition, I _   
_would be_   
_out-powered,_   
_ as much as I hate to admit it._

_Skyler for one was a human with many sides. He was a merciless con man when he was working on a mark. I saw it in his eyes when he was helping me to kill the 'Con that night. He _   
_had_   
_ probably never helped before in killing anyone, but he knew that there was no room for _   
_regrets_   
_. Yet, he was compassionate to those he considered his friends and family._

_However, his willingness_   
_ to accept and share my pain was probably what shocked me the most._

_If he meant what he said…_

_Did he consider me as family?_

_I don't know if he does._

_But I feel he does._

_He went to great lengths to help me and even risked his own life _   
_in fighting_   
_ Dreadnought._

_It was like I had found another brother._

_Only this one was organic._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

 

**TBC…**

  
**   
**   


 

 


	9. When Family Calls, A Severed Bond

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 9: When Family Calls, A Severed Bond ~**

****

* * *

  
_Con man Log Entry 2.04: Hiding the Truth from the Family._

 

_City of Springfield, Missouri, US._

_A very common question people usually ask is that, what's the difference between a con man and your regular cat burglar?_

_Well, there's hardly any._

_They're both liars, have sticky fingers for what they crave or are thieves, and have huge egos._

_Yes, I admit it fair and square I have my own big ego._

_You don't have to remind me._

_It's there._

_However, you see, there is one large significance that makes them different. Cat burglars are used to the more physical type of con, and usually it's a 'one man show'. __Even __if they happen to have many links or networks it's not always the strongest, as rivals are more numerous. As you have guessed, they're usually alone. It's one hell of an epic struggle to get to the top that the demands are high if you ever wish to make a name of yourself. Unless you happen to be taught by a legendary thief and you're his/her student or successor. Since you're by yourself doing your thieving work, when the authorities knows you've done it, you're good as dead. Not to mention alone._

_On the other hand, the con man usually relies on his victims to bring him their own money (as they can get too greedy for their own good) which doesn't really require physical strength unless you don't have a brain working. Nevertheless, to make it all work, __he__ relies on his networks,__ what is__ simply called 'the group'. Many have come to call them 'shills' but we prefer to call it as the 'Grifter family' or 'Con family'. Best thing is that you're never really alone in whatever you do unless you choose to be. There are more choices, chances, backup and even __the possibility to __have someone better than you help you out in a part you can't cope with or suck at._

_I remember particularly well how Uncle Rusty viewed it. He said,_

"_Remember, a good friend will come and bail you out of jail, but a true friend will be sitting beside you and say: 'Man we screwed up!'."_

_It was a metaphor of saying 'we're with you through thick or thin', and that true friends are your family. Especially those who were the long con artists. Even if you did end up in jail, there was always another person in the family that would eventually take your place and con on the person who got you in jail the first place. We look after each other, we watch each other's backs, and give a helping hand when someone's in trouble._

_As much as I could I kept to the family code, __but __on the inside it somehow hit me that I was very much alone when it came to saving Steve. It was eating me up inside that I was hiding the truth about an alien war from them. But I couldn't drag them into a war they had no part of, not when I was the one who was responsible for getting into it in the first place._

_If I couldn't tell them what it was, at least I would give them a clue that I was in a tight spot, it was my own business, and that only I could finish it._

_The moment of truth was going to happen tomorrow when I get to Kansas City. Playing poker that night was probably the one way I could get my mind fired up and do a bit of revenge at the same time. Well, I did have thoughts of 'talking it out' so it wouldn't bother me tomorrow morning. __Maybe__ a small chat with Sunstreaker would do the trick. That was if he wanted to._

_But, if Sunstreaker only came to Earth to look for his twin, __have __they had been alone for all this time? Highly likely, I was almost certain because of the war on Cybertron there was hardly anything left called 'family'__ for any of his kind__._

_Doing the 'family talk' with an Autobot?_

_I wasn't so sure how he would react, but if there was a chance to make our partnership into something of a family bond I was going to give it a chance._

_I knew one thing for sure; our journey in facing Soundwave wasn't going to be short._

_Having a 'brother' sounded better than 'just a friend'._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

  
The silence of tense anticipation was felt throughout the garage.

 

Phing, dealer of the poker game, gazed at the contenders with exhilaration as the last ones left reached the point where the stakes were highest. A normal 'small blind' was about 500 dollars, which meant each and every bet this round started with 1000 dollars to stay in the game unless the player 'folded'.

He first looked at Keith, also known as 'the Ghost'. The elder Caucasian brunette man with green eyes was weighing on the choices whether he should bet big or not. Unlike the rest of the crew, he was around 27 years old, the oldest of the group.

Next to him was Susan, the small long haired blond who was the same age as the last player, younger by only a few months. She was looking at the cards in front of her with confidence, and seemed to think that her charms would be her way of winning tonight.

Next to her was Eddie, a bold young man with gray eyes that darted around the other players to see if he could bluff or not as he looked uncertain of whether the cards he had would keep him in the game.

Last but not least, Phing looked at his buddy Skyler, who was doing the 'poker face'. There wasn't really any expression on his face; it was as if he was thinking of something else. The young Chinese man did note that his eyes were on the Lamborghini once in a while but his gaze always returned to the table like he was in a trance. He was the youngest of all the people who were in the room with a difference of two months from Phing, but he wasn't to be underestimated.

So far it was the first stage of the 'flop', where three cards were laid out on the floor to everyone, so they would have some idea as to how far they could bet.

In order the cards were all the same suit of diamonds, an Ace, Queen, and Jack.

All the other players were waiting on Eddie's decision on whether he was going to call it or not as it was his turn first.

Sunstreaker, who was on the other side of the group, watched with great interest how Skyler was going to play this round. The Autobot was aware that all of the players were seeking to sleep in for the night, soon to go their separate ways. The human who was his now so-called partner in crime was ever silent not really caring what the others thought. So far, the game was intense enough that everyone was careful but willing to bid big, which had turned the situation into a stalemate (everyone had nearly the same number of poker chips). Not that Sunny was surprised; being con artists, all of these people were good at bluffing and acting.

The question was…

Who was better?

At this point Keith had the highest count for his chips with 4500 dollars and Eddie the lowest with 4000. Skyler and Susan were in between.

To the warrior Autobot it was an interesting game of skill, strategy, and control of greed. Considering it was part of the job as a con man to control their greed in order to gain their victim's money, the air around the players was enough to make Sunstreaker eager to keep on watching the game, even if the game was primitive in not using computers or anything digital or tech. Still, the skill and challenge was there, and that was more enough to make things intriguing.

The rules of the game were simple. Dealer deals two cards for each player and each player bets to state they have the best combination of cards. First is the 'small blind' (half the smallest bet), the next player to him bets the 'big blind' (smallest bet allowed every round), and all players have to bet in the same number of chips with the big blind, unless someone raises their bet. Once someone 'raises', it would be considered the lowest bet all players should follow. If a player can't bet because they don't have enough, they could either 'fold' - which meant giving up the round - or put all their chips in, risking getting kicked out of the game if they lost.

Winner of course received the whole pool of winnings.

Keith was tapping his fingers on the floor impatiently. "Come on Eddie, we don't have all night. We have to hit the sack soon. We're leaving early tomorrow."

"Just a minute," Eddie complained. He peeked at his cards again that were on the floor. He had an Ace of spades and a Jack of clubs. His eye hungrily looked at the current cards that were laid out during the flop.

Ace, Queen, and Jack.

Two Aces and Jacks would create a 'two pair'. With a sigh as he bit his lip, Eddie made his decision shoving chips in, "Raise, 1000. Lowest bet is two thousand, guys."

Susan confidently looking at her cards shoved more chips in, "Bet, 1000. We'll be making it three thousand is the lowest bet. Your turn, Keith." She didn't need to look at her cards on the floor as she had a pair of Queens, one clubs and the other spades. Three of a kind was good enough to beat a double pair.

The next player paused for the moment. "Call," Keith said as he followed suit. He was sure of himself as he had a pair of aces. He didn't want to show that he had the highest cards around, but he didn't want to loose all his chips, either.

Skyler shoved his chips in immediately without thinking, "Call." He sighed.

"Wanting to get the game over with, Sky?" Susan asked curiously.

Skyler rolled his eyes. "You guys don't have to worry about doing a quick paint job on a car, you know. Even if Phing rigged and erased all camera recordings of the entire traffic system yesterday, it doesn't change the fact that many witnesses saw a yellow Lambo doing the crazy stunt of jumping over a whole blockade. Eddie?"

Eddie, thinking that Skyler already had enough of the game, said, "Raise! 4000 chips is the lowest bet."

Susan shook her head to it. "Sorry, I can't resist. I'm All-in!"

"All-in it is, beautiful," Keith said, smiling as he shoved all his chips into the pool. "Finally we can get this over with."

"All-in," Skyler said, following suit, his pile small compared to the other two.

Eddie, not wanting to loose out and still sure that his cards were full proof said, "Fine! All in!"

"All right, everyone bids all in with a total of 13.000 dollars," Phing announced, not really believing the number. He took out the fourth card, and then the last showing out to all the players on the floor.

Ace (Diamonds), Queen (Diamond), Jack (Diamond), Four (Clubs), Seven, (Hearts)

"Winner has the highest combination. Eddie, we start with you," Phing said.

"Two Aces and Jacks. Two pair." Eddie stated confidently.

Susan smiled, "Sorry, Eddie. Three Queens; that makes it 'three of a kind'! Hah!"

"Hold on," Keith raised his hand. "Three Aces, three of a kind, but higher than yours. Sorry love, the pool's mine!"

Both Eddie and Susan's faces turned to look offended.

"Not yet," Phing interjected. "We have to see Skyler's cards first."

They looked at Skyler, whose mind had clearly drifted off as he was looking elsewhere.

"Skyler?" Phing called.

"Huh?" Skyler blinked as he was shaken out of his thoughts.

"Open your cards."

"Alright," Skyler said, heaving a breath. "It's not much."

He flipped them, revealing a King of Diamonds and a Ten of Diamonds. Skyler then pointed out the cards that were laid out and moved his next to them creating a sequence of the same suit, Ace, King, Queen, Jack, and a Ten.

"Royal Flush."

"WHAT?" Keith yelled. The other two only gaped.

"It's a Royal Flush, everybody. Three players all busted. All chips go to Skyler!" Phing announced the winner.

"I win, guys," Skyler smiled. "Pay up."

"That was awesome, Skyler!" Rachel hugged her cousin as she laughed with Skyler.

Eddie looked more sullen, "Where DO you LEARN doing this crap?"

"Try having Uncle Danny and Uncle Rusty as your poker mentors, you'll end up with a bruised ego," the winner of poker match said. He remembered none too fondly, "I know mine got bulldozed over flat with them. Not a pleasant experience."

Reluctantly Keith pulled out a thick bundle of cash from their heist. "You said that about the whole car paint job thing on purpose, did you?"

"I wasn't lying," Skyler shrugged still smiling. "Just giving the boost to end the game."

"Having a cool car and the hundred grand isn't enough for you?" Keith asked irritably. "I paid you four times for doing the crazy stunt."

Skyler snorted, "Doesn't count the fact if I didn't make it you guys would be with the cops right now. Next time, make sure the exit strategy is for _everyone._ If you got Rachel into jail, you'd have to deal with Uncle Robert's wrath. For the poker game, you guys joined in the bet anyway. It was fair game."

"Ok, fine. It was my mistake. I'm not doing it again," Keith admitted. "Sorry about it, Sky. Rachel's more important to you. I respect that." He took out a hand, "My apologies. And if anything stupid like that happens again you're free to punch me. Brothers in arms?"

Skyler nodded as he took the other's handshake, "Apology accepted. Brothers in arms." It was settled with a brief hug and a pat on the back.

Eddie gave his and Susan's payment to Skyler. The youngest con man smiled at the bundles that were equal to twenty-five grand. It was good investment if he ever needed to hide Decepticon remains, as paying for container storage, security, and transport wasn't cheap. He'd also have to get the wax he promised Sunstreaker, the bot deserved it as he was the one who actually did the jump.

"Hey, Sky. You sure you don't want help with getting Steve?" Keith asked.

The other shook his head. "It's cool, and I have help already. I'll be on my way to Kansas City tomorrow. Maybe sometime after, I'll get in touch with you all again. Where are you guys heading after this?"

"Denver, Colorado, we're going to stay there for a few months," the elder grifter said. "If you're ever in town, just drop by. We'll help you out if you need anything."

"Sure will, thanks," Skyler said.

The other smiled. "Anything for family. By the way," Keith took out a small photo from his jacket. "Would you happen to know who this is?"

Skyler glanced at the photo, recognizing who was in it. "Yeah, I do. But what's up with this guy?"

"You remember the old grifter, Uncle Lenny, who retired and opened up an orphanage?" Susan inquired. "The guy in the picture got some hooligans to do his dirty work and bought the land where the orphanage was based."

"Some important 'caring' government official he is," Eddie commented sourly. "How he got the job in the first place is beyond me. Having some strings to pull in the military and parliament makes him an 'untouchable' mark."

"He's not untouchable, and if you guys are going for him, I suggest you lay off," Skyler suggested with serious tone.

Rachel frowned, "Skyler, what's wrong? I get the feeling you know something."

"Uncle Danny, Uncle Rusty, and the whole crew are on to this guy as the mark," the young con man said. "And I mean everybody."

Eddie didn't believe what he was hearing. "How did he piss off the whole crew?"

"I don't know," Skyler said. "But if you want to join in, they're moving around back and forth between Las Vegas and Washington D.C. for bases. I'm sure they'd welcome more manpower and give you the details about him."

Keith nodded at that. "Thanks for the info, Sky. I think I'll give Uncle Rusty a call once we're in Denver."

"Any time."

One by one, everyone departed, headed for their hotels. Before leaving, Rachel insisted that if anything went wrong, whether he got Steve or not, he would always be welcomed in Denver and back in California. Phing, after cleaning up the poker chips, retired upstairs. The young con man stayed behind in the garage, saying he was going to do a quick paint job before he settled in. Seeing as the whole thing was over, Sunstreaker finally got his peace and quiet back.

"So," Sunstreaker made his existence clear to the human. "What color should it be?"

Skyler's eyes drifted. "How about metallic blue?"

Sunstreaker wasn't exactly happy about it as it reminded him of an extremely 'talkative' Autobot named 'Bluestreak', but it was by all counts better than lime green. "Hmph. Works for me, any other changes?"

"Change your license plate number, including the state to Kansas," Skyler noted. "I suppose that's it."

In a flash of light, now stood a metallic blue Lamborghini in front of him in the place of the yellow one.

"Impressive play of being innocent," Sunstreaker commented. "I didn't think there was such a game that manipulated emotions and used skills at the same time."

"It's a way to keep him on his toes when it comes to Rachel," Skyler said defensively. "But that's poker for you."

Sunstreaker made a blunt approach on something that was bugging him, "Human, even if you were sure of your win, you've been nervous throughout the game. Why is that?"

Skyler was silent as he was uncertain to talk about it. He knew that Sunstreaker must have used his scanners throughout the poker game.

"I'm not sure but…I think those feelings weren't mine."

"Were they Steve's?" Sunny automatically asked.

This of course caught Skyler's attention. "I suppose so..."

"You suppose so? Don't human twins have a bond?" The Autobot asked, making sure he wasn't misunderstanding something.

Now Skyler was aware Sunstreaker was asking about 'the twin thing.' "Well, I know about 'the twin thing' but I'm not sure how your 'twin bond' works with Sideswipe in full detail. Could be the same, or it might not. You'll have to explain it for me."

Sunstreaker snorted, "Listen up, because I'm not repeating myself."

"I'm all ears."

Satisfied he had the human's full attention, the Autobot went into a full account on how his spark and his brother's were deeply connected to one another from the time they were sparked. Sunstreaker explained how he could feel his brother's emotions and even communicate by thought. Skyler was awed by how deep the connection went. Even if all this time he was only guessing things, at least they weren't very far off. The fact that now both of them were cut off from each other, the young con man realized just how painful it was for Sunstreaker to close off the bond. It was like ripping out half of your heart and coping with just the other half.

"So how does it go for human twins?" Sunstreaker asked.

Skyler shrugged, "Very similar, but it depends on our bond with each other I expect. Although there are some researches that pretty much say identical twins have the strongest bond, there are cases where it happens to other people with intimate or intense relationships."

Sunny went to the point to get his answer. "How about you and Steve?"

"Only if we're in an extreme situation or a feeling, like in danger or hurt," Skyler tried to remember. "I remember from when we were little, Steve got lost at a mall, separated from my mom, and I was somewhere else with my dad. I think I was in the car at the time. Dad later said I kept on fidgeting and pouting about whether Steve was ok or not. But when Steve was found, I stopped. Does that count?"

"Yes."

The human sighed. "I don't know why, but it's been building up lately. At times I can't ignore it at all. I feel he's in real trouble."

"Don't ignore it, human," Sunstreaker scolded. "It's your twin, for Primus' sake!"

"Okay, okay, I won't ever ignore it, starting from now on," Skyler gave up. "I only hope he can hang on until we get there. I hate worrying and not doing something about it, goes against my nature."

Sunstreaker couldn't help but agree on that. "You'll have to learn one day to always not rely on plans. Especially when something spontaneous comes up and you can't rely on plans alone."

The con man sighed again. "I know. But tell me, Sunstreaker, if you're cutting off the bond with Sideswipe because of what Soundwave did to you, how worse can it get if your twin tries to re-connect with you again?"

"I'll be fine, human. Don't go worrying all over me," the Autobot said stubbornly.

Skyler was not impressed. "Sunstreaker, you could have ended up dead when we fought with Dreadnought! Those pain spasms you experienced were a hazard when we fought the 'Con. If the part happens where we can't even help each other out or we're both in trouble, it'll be the death of both of us. This is your life we're talking about, not to mention how your death will eventually connect to Sideswipe."

The warrior bot grumbled, "I'm NOT talking about it now."

Skyler took that as a sign to stop prodding.

_The bot was heading __toward__ his touchy side._

_Not good._

"Well, you can tell me if you change your mind." The con man sighed, knowing it was best not to tread on dangerous territory. "I'm not going to push on it further."

"You're not?" Sunstreaker said, a bit surprised.

"Rules in a con man family, Sunstreaker," Skyler pointed out. "Never force anyone to say anything, everyone has a choice if they want to. But the offer of help is always opened to any family member." He then shifted back and walked towards the door. "I'll see you in the morning, Sunstreaker."

"Human?"

Skyler stopped and looked back. "What?"

Sunstreaker felt uncomfortable, but asked anyway, "You consider me family?"

The young con man shrugged and smiled. "Yeah. It's part of the 'family' thing to look out for each other, including entrusting your lives to each other. We're on a crazy journey saving my twin, getting to yours, and going against a Decepticon Intel officer, I wouldn't doubt at all about having you as a brother in arms, mech."

"You're a really weird human, you know that?" Sunstreaker avoided the last statement, although secretly he felt the same understanding. "I'm not even human, you know."

"That's the best part of extensive family, mech. It knows no bounds and it's universal," Skyler said. "Night, Sunstreaker."

"Later, Skyler," Sunstreaker could only say, still having difficulty believing what the human said.

In a way it did made sense what Skyler had said about those rules. Even if the other fleshling by the name of the 'Ghost' or Keith had wanted to help Skyler in getting Steve he was adamant on not forcing whatever Skyler did not wish to tell. The Autobot also noted this behavior with his uncles back at Memphis. It was a sign of respect for privacy but there was never a case where the family would not leave those who needed help unattended.

Sunstreaker was very aware that it was somewhat dangerous for him to get attached to a human as their lives were short.

But here was someone willing to consider him 'family', despite the risks involved.

For the first time in what seemed to be eons, his spark calmed a little.

He wasn't alone.

* * *

"Keep trying if you know what's good for ya, brat. Try getting the firewall down faster!"

Another bead of sweat dripped from the youth's forehead, trailing down his already damp face. In all his 21 years, he'd never been in such a dangerous position. What had started as a slight suspicion had turned quickly into him being kidnapped by an underground crime syndicate. All he could do now was focus on the task he was given and kept his breathing under control, without much luck in either department.

_Who wouldn't be__ nervous with__ a loaded hand gun digging __into__ the side of their head?_

Steve Knight was terrified.

Even if he had put up a good stubborn fight in not telling the kidnappers anything, the bluff could only last for so long. He was starting to regret that he wasn't as good as his twin brother when it came to steering another person's emotions the way he wanted.

Skyler was probably the better con man than he was.

The whole chaos started off when both he and his twin, Skyler had followed an abnormal data burst trying to hack its way into an unknown government military sub-division. Crazy thing was, they ended up defending the government. Whoever the hacker was, it was already bizarre that he/she had managed to hack into the military server in less than five minutes, something which many hackers would not try in a lifetime unless they were entirely sure they could manage it without getting caught. It would have been an easy picking to support the other hacker, but what better way to make your username famous if one could defeat the hacker? What they both weren't expecting was the huge reaction that went out over the internet.

Most - if not all - large computer and tech companies such as Microsoft, Dell, Macintosh and many more were setting up rewards for whoever found them.

To make things worse, the American government and even other countries were after them.

_It was official._

_They were wanted._

Steve was thankful that Skyler had created a program that randomized their IP location, if not he was fairly certain he would have been interrogated by whoever was trying to find them ages ago. They both had promised each other that no one was to know about it. However, things did not turn out that way.

_That dim-witted Murphy's Law had to stick its rear out._

One day, his friend Natalie came to visit and said she was investigating a mark that one of her uncles was going to con. The details were vague, but Steve agreed to help and accompany her if things got ugly. As a matter of a fact, they did. They entered a test that was supposed to measure their hacking skills. In the end, both of them and thirteen others were separated from the other participants of the expo.

So here Steve was, experiencing the worst case scenario any con man or hacker would always try to avoid at all costs. Steve fumbled a few times as he wrote out his current code sequence in an attempt to hide the fact he was the hacker they were looking for. As frightened as he was, it sounded logical if he deliberately failed in trying to break the firewall due to sheer panic. It wasn't like they were going to kill him just yet, not when the candidates had so far shrunk from fifteen to four.

From time to time, his eyes darted to something the kidnappers had brought in – perhaps stolen? - recently. Even if he was surprised to see it, Steve was also amazed to see a silver Chevrolet Corvette Stingray Concept here, of all places. But back to pressing matters, he kept on fumbling the codes, the screen continuing to flash 'Access Denied', in hopes that they'd get the message he wasn't able to get in.

_Please let this work._

__

* * *

 

Sideswipe silently fumed.

_Human morons and their primitive ways of trying to get him opened._

Yes, he was subjected to the Prime's orders not to harm humans. The only thing tempting him to break them now was the humans who had failed numerous times to reach the steering wheel through the doors and were now trying to smash his windows.

_Like he was going to let them drive him._

Still, the warrior Autobot cursed at himself for being such a glitched bot. After trying to reach into his twin's bond, he had fainted and ended being taken by the fleshlings he was spying on. Good news was that he was in the main base of the kidnappers' organization. Bad news on the other hand, he couldn't do much. Not that he was afraid of the humans finding out he wasn't an ordinary car, he just could not move at all.

Sideswipe rolled his optics.

He was paralyzed to the spot.

_Way to go, Sides, if Sunny was here he'd be laughing at you._

Well, it was his fault for trying to reconnect with his twin in the middle of the mission. The only thing that could actually make him feel better was the fact he had felt that Sunstreaker was alive somewhere. Hopefully he was close. What Sideswipe did not understand was why Sunny insisted on closing the bond. Just what in the universe happened to his twin to make him close the bond off? Being lightyears away he could understand, but if Sunny was now closer, then how come he still refused to connect? Was he caught by the Decepticons? Sides wasn't sure about anything.

Sideswipe sighed inwardly in relief when the humans finally stopped trying to get inside of him, their attention now on the hacker they were trying to coax in breaking a firewall simulation. He noted that there were four hostages in the large warehouse they were in (the other three on the opposite side of the room). As for their location, the Autobot had found through his scanners that they were in the building next to the warehouse in the older industrial area.

:: Optimus Prime to Sideswipe. ::

_Oh great, the Big guy had to call at a time like this._

Nevertheless he chose to answer. :: Sideswipe to Prime, I hear you loud and clear. ::

:: Why have you not answered any messages in the last few hours? :: Optimus asked.

Sideswipe answered carefully. :: My spark started to act up again, I'm stuck at the moment where I am. ::

:: I'll send you backup- ::

:: No! I'm alright, big boss, no need. :: the silver bot interrupted quickly. :: I just need a quick rest before I'm on again. I've already infiltrated the human organization in their main base. ::

Optimus noted this new information. :: Where is their base? Are the human hackers being held as hostages unharmed? ::

:: Kansas City in the old abandoned industrial area. I'll send the coordinates. The humans are still alive, although they're going through a couple of beatings at the moment. :: Sideswipe responded. It was just like their leader to worry about the innocent humans first.

:: What of the hackers? The human intelligence team did detect they were trying to replicate the same codes as they did for the breach. Is there a match to the breach amongst the hackers? ::

:: Negative, at least not yet. :: Sideswipe sighed. :: Although there are about four of them that were nearly able to get the codes right. They're in the same room with me right now. ::

The commander of the Autobots analyzed the situation carefully. Perhaps if they sent a head on rescue it'll endanger the lives of the hostages. He made a note to himself to contact Major Lennox as soon as possible.

:: Sideswipe, keep an eye on the hostages. Should you find the right match of the hackers, you are to bring the human(s) to base. We'll prepare a team to send to Kansas City tomorrow. Report to me if you find anything else. Optimus out ::

:: Yes, sir. Sideswipe out. ::

At least that didn't go so bad. He did however feel disappointed that his solo mission had become screwed up. The silver bot was very well aware he was going to get a few dents from the CMO when he got back. But before his mind floated back to the medic, it was interrupted by the sounds of kicks and punches.

"Ugh…"

Sideswipe's attention was immediately on the injured human crumpled on the floor about a foot away from him. The human wasn't bleeding, although there were bound to be bruise marks. The bot only hoped that the innocent ones would be free tomorrow if everything went alright. He didn't really have a choice but to watch what was happening as he couldn't do anything to interfere.

"Geez, Phil, looks like the sore loser's hiding something," one member said, pinning the young man to the ground.

Phil, standing beside him, huffed in frustration. "Tried every sort of method, Jeph. Bloody kid keeps on failing the codes! Maybe he needs more persuasion."

"Looks like we tried everything but _that_," another of the member said. "Besides, we can't resort to fatal or bleeding injuries coz the boss ordered."

Phil looked rather skeptic. "Just get it done, Marco! Boss hasn't been too happy we haven't gotten the last four to confess yet. Either they're not the ones we're looking for or we missed something."

"Shut your mouth, Phil," Marco said stiffly. He knelt down and grabbed the young man's hair.

Steve winced at the rough pull, but faced the other defiantly.

"What do we have here? A good rebel," Marco commented.

The hacker stayed silent.

Marco was impressed how the hostage was reacting. "Well, if you have to be that way," he shrugged and pulled out a photo out of his pocket. "Steve was it? Would you happen to know who's in this picture?"

Sideswipe noticed that the human's facial expression changed into fear when the picture was…himself?

_What the frag was going on?_

"How about it, guys? We got ourselves one identical twin," Marco laughed tauntingly, letting go and standing to hover over the hostage. "Looks like your twin Skyler picked up that you were missing and is searching for ya, brat. This photo proves it. It was taken this morning in Jonesborough. Isn't that sweet? Aww, his twin big brother is looking for the younger one."

This made Steve's blood boil. "How could you know? He's got nothing to do with-"

But before the young man could talk anymore, he was rewarded with a kick to the face. Steve gasped in pain as he dizzily tried to keep awake.

"You'll talk when you're ordered to, brat," Marcos spat. "Of course we know Skyler; he's your only remaining family member. We just had to try and find him. As you can see, we did, and if you don't tell us anything, we're going to hunt him. Tell us something, we'll leave him alone."

The dark haired injured hacker struggled to speak, his injuries bothering his mind too much for him to think clearly. He managed to gasp, "I don't know anything about the code breach. I saw it, that's all."

Marco said disapprovingly, "That's what you said last time, Steve. I think we need new information."

_Like hell he was going to tell them!_

The young con man stayed silent instead.

Bad move.

The next thing he knew, he was tasting dirt on the floor and yelled in agony as Marco planted a heavy foot on his head.

"Some scientists say that when an identical twin is subjected to pain the other feels it was well," the thug said mockingly, lessening the pressure a little at a sharp look from his companion. "Come on, Steve, you can do better than that. If your brother feels your pain right now, then he's bound to get to this city very soon."

A reply only came in ragged breaths, "I…don't…know…"

Angry that he didn't get any new information, Marco kicked Steve in the back of the head, rendering him unconscious.

Sideswipe watched helplessly as they bound the comatose human and left him there. He mulled over the fact it was the first time he had encountered a human twin. While their situation didn't concern him, Sideswipe felt the same sentiment towards the human for being separated from his elder twin, who was apparently searching for the younger.

Was Sunny looking for him too?

_Just where are you, Sunny?_

With his entire spark he hoped everything would be sorted out once he could move again.

First and foremost, he needed to rescue the hostages. Fortunately, his scans hadn't picked up any 'Cons in the area, but he would still have to wait for the next day to make his move.

* * *

Laserbeak couldn't believe his luck.

There was an Autobot there.

It was one of those twins.

Sideswipe.

He remembered how his master had dealt with the other one, knowing what a blow it would be to the Autobots. Considering this piece of scrap was alive, the other must have died back on Cybertron. It wasn't like anyone could have survived that sort of tampering to the spark. That idiotic elder twin had sacrificed himself so the younger one could live.

If this one could be off-lined as well, it would be another chance to dishearten the opposing faction.

Yet, what interested the spy the most was why the bot was here.

One of the hackers or both of them were among those humans.

He noted that the Autobots could have picked up the trail of the simulations.

:: Laserbeak to Soundwave. ::

:: Soundwave responding. :: the immediate reply said.

:: No progress on which is the right hacker fleshling, however we have company. ::

Sensing Laserbeak's apprehension, Soundwave inquired, :: Which Autobot is at your current location? ::

:: The remaining twin, Sideswipe. ::

:: Do not engage him unless you must. :: Soundwave said strictly. He was not going to risk losing another of his underlings. :: Attempt to retrieve the right human quickly. If that fails, there are other orders as well from Megatron for you, Laserbeak. ::

From Megatron? That surprised the metallic bird bot, but he kept those feelings hidden. :: I will do whatever Lord Megatron says. ::

:: Acceptable. Should you fail to find the human hacker, you are to prepare the next Intel breach into NEST. ::

* * *

_Next morning…_

Skyler couldn't help but feel dizzy.

For some idiotic reason, it felt like he had a hangover but he knew he hadn't drank any alcohol last night.

_Shouldn't sleep make you feel better?_

He was starting to reason with himself why he was having other pains on his body when he knew nothing had happened to him when he was asleep. There was no way someone could have bashed him up in the middle of the night. First, there were security sensors around the neighborhood. Second, Phing wasn't stupid enough to leave a window or whatever opened. Third and last, there was an Autobot in the garage. The con man knew nothing escaped the scanners of the massive mech, not even a mouse.

While he was pondering this strange phenomenon, the waitress came in with the food he requested.

Skyler thanked her as he ate his salad. He ate just quickly enough to savor the taste and to quickly finish his meal. Sunstreaker was waiting for him at a hotel car cleanup garage. They had agreed that getting up earlier and finishing what they needed to do in order to get to their main aim was important. Time was ticking, and they had little to spend on the things they needed to do before leaving for their final destination.

Even while eating, Skyler wore a disguise. Not expecting company, he glanced up in surprise when a girl with wavy dark brown hair and the same cobalt eyes suddenly sat beside him at his table.

He recognized her. "Rachel?"

"Lookie-loo?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah," Skyler sighed, still scratching his head because of the headache. "I thought you already left with Keith."

"Nah, I decided to hang around until my youngest cousin goes to rescue his twin." She smiled. "Or maybe I'm going to join him."

Skyler only looked at her seriously. "You don't want to be involved with this."

"But this is Steve we're talking about!" Rachel whispered with a pout.

The younger man shook his head. "No way, not now. This isn't a joke."

Rachel gave him a cynical look. "You think I'm laughing, Skyler? You need help."

"If you help me, I'm going to put you in danger. This isn't any normal con enemy," Skyler argued.

"Then what is it?"

He hesitantly said, "I can't tell you."

"And why not, Skyler? You and Steve are family! We're supposed to look after each other!" Rachel pressed as she kept her voice to a whisper.

That really ate up Skyler's heart inwardly. He gravely said, "Sorry, I can't."

"Is there anything I can at least pass on to Uncle Robert and my parents?"

"No."

Still not giving up, she asked again, "Can I join you?"

Skyler didn't answer, his facial expression making clear his dissent.

Rachel sighed and made one last desperate plea, "Fine. I'm not going with you. But can you _please_ tell me _why_?"

The younger cousin didn't speak at first. Though he knew he needed to tell her something, it came out haltingly, his voice choked with sadness.

"…I don't want to lose another sister. And…you're my only sister left."

Rachel's heart faltered, she knew how close the twins and their sister, Scarlet, had been. Skyler in particular, being the eldest of the siblings, had always cared for Scarlet, dealing brutally with guys who tried to mess with her, with Steve acting as his backup in getting revenge. As if the death of his parents wasn't enough, losing his younger sister had done a great deal of damage to Skyler. His more cheerful side had vanished like smoke, and in its place was mostly sarcasm and, at times, bitter cold. Her cousin never had a knack to deny something, even help. To Rachel, it was a realization how much the Mission City incident changed him.

Eyes closed, Skyler took another breath and added, "I'm really sorry, Rachel. It's the only way I can protect you."

Tears pouring down her cheeks, Rachel hugged her cousin, silently promising to let her cousin make his own choice.

"I forgive you," she whispered back. "But as long as we're around, you're always welcomed back to the family, Skyler. So whatever you do, wherever you go, come back and visit, okay? We'll always have our doors opened for you."

He didn't care if somebody was watching a girl crying on his shoulder. She was important to him, she was family. If there was anything he was glad for, Skyler was thankful for her crying out his tears in his place. He hadn't cried openly since the funeral of his parents and sister or even shed a tear. It was as if they had dried out. Usually Steve was the one who took his place when it came to the emotional things. Finally having the acceptance and as well as relief he could continue his journey, he simply said,

"Thank you, Rachel."

* * *

After separating with his cousin and sending her off from the train station, Skyler made it back to where Sunstreaker was ready and waiting for him.

He paid the bill with cash and even gave a large tip to the cleaners - the metallic blue Lamborghini looked good as new.

Skyler then took his normal position in the driver's seat and they left the hotel. Once they were a good deal away from people who had their eyes on them, he let the steering wheel go, giving the Autobot total control.

"You took your time, human." Sunstreaker said, a bit annoyed.

Skyler sighed. "Rachel came by at breakfast, and I had to make it up to her, since she couldn't come with me. Too dangerous."

"So you're done with this town?" Sunstreaker asked, more to change the subject than for an actual response, not wanting to poke into family matters.

"Yeah," the con man said, opening his map. "Phing's going to clean up and leave in another two hours. We're good as done."

Sunstreaker was actually glad the whole first step was over. The Decepticon was dead, the human got to meet with his 'family', and the success of the heist and the poker game overpay was good for provisions on the journey ahead. However, the second part of their journey was going to be more difficult. Of course, the main priority had always been Skyler's twin. Sunstreaker was going to make sure he kept his part of the bargain he'd made with Skyler after the human found Sideswipe within the collected data of what even a program considered failed results. However, something had disturbed him that morning.

"Are you well, human?" Sunstreaker asked accusingly.

The human was silent, but Sunstreaker knew there was a skip in his heartbeat.

Rolling his optics, he said, "Don't lie, Skyler."

_Damn it, why did robotic aliens have to have such sensitive scanners?_

Skyler huffed, knowing he wasn't going to get out of this easily. "Where do I start my explanation?"

"How about from the start?" Sunny pointed out the obvious.

"Alright, after last night I feel like someone pounded on my head and beat the living crap out of me while I was asleep," Skyler explained thoroughly. He rubbed his head. "It feels real but I know I was in bed sleeping."

A snort. "It's not like anyone or anything can get past my scanners easily."

There was a worried look upon the human's features. "What happens if the pain I felt was Steve?"

"… Then he's in pain or subjected to some beating or the kind," Sunstreaker answered uncomfortably. "Human-"

"How much faster can you go than last time?" Skyler interrupted quickly, surprising the Autobot with the question.

_And here I thought the human was traumatized __by__ my insane maneuvering._

_Something's pushed the human to his limit._

"Enough to make you faint," Sunstreaker said as he learned from the data the human gave to him that humans had a limit of tolerating gravitational force.

Skyler thought it over. "Ok. Speed up to the point where I can still remain conscious."

"Are you going to say why you're panicking like this?" Sunstreaker asked again, knowing there was something behind it.

The human was hesitant in his response. "Sunstreaker, do you remember how many codes were the basic input from the demo of the hacker war I did with Steve?"

"Yes, over five thousand different codes and variations," Sunstreaker replied.

"Alright, now what if I tell you that all those codes were input manually by one person?" Skyler asked.

"WHAT!" Sunstreaker said, baffled. "You're saying your brother can remember that many codes WITHOUT making a SINGLE mistake?"

The con man sighed. "It's what we call an 'eidetic' memory, or in more popular words 'photographic memory'. The reason why anyone can't replicate the way we hacked was because the method was based on Steve's gift, which I don't have. He can remember things, but as much as it's his strength, it's also a weakness."

Then Sunstreaker realized the problem. "He can't forget."

"Yes, and when it's a real bad experience he can never forget it," Skyler said, voice cold as steel. "Ever."

Knowing now that the stakes were even higher than before, as soon as Sunstreaker hit the freeway, he shot to the speed that Skyler requested.

 

* * *

  
_Autobot Mission Log Entry 2.04: A Race to Kansas City_

 

_Planet Earth, Springfield, Missouri, US._

_Family was something that I probably left behind all those eons ago when the war started. After the war started there was no such thing as family, it was just me and Sides all the time. Even if I did have some partnerships with the other Autobots, there wasn't really a feeling for something like it. It was painful and the loss was too high. One day you knew them, the next day they suddenly died on the battlefield. I grew to hate making ties with anyone other than my twin or weaklings as the guilt trip would probably take out my spark more easily than I could __imagine__._

_To me, bonds, especially family bonds, were non-existent._

_But it was Skyler __who__ reminded me that you didn't really need to keep facing things alone._

_I guess I've been__ alone__ long enough. __Now it's__ time to adapt to whatever __is__ thrown at me._

_So, __I've been__ officially declared a 'brother' __of__ an organic._

_Primus, I __never would have thought this could happen, not__ in a lifetime!_

_His 'family' that was formed from his hereditary family and his extensive family was interesting to say the least. While it was a typical human family thing for them to recall memories and enjoy having fun, having those family outings, Skyler's family was all about blackmailing each other, sharing information on marks, and even pouring over interesting happenings around the country. Yet the ties were there and forever strong._

_Of course, there were always surprises when it came to the human I was traveling with._

_So when Skyler explained that his brother had a knack to remember but not to forget, it nearly blew my circuits._

_A human without any programming or the like but CAN'T forget?_

_It was amazing no doubt, if you WANT to remember something._

_Not so nice when you NEVER want to recall something._

_Especially when that 'something' was torture._

_Slag it, I better speed things up._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

  
**TBC…**

 

**   
**


	10. Out of Hand's Reach, Unwanted Unexpected Meeting

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 10: Out of Hand's Reach, Unwanted Unexpected Meeting ~**

****

* * *

  
_Con man Log Entry 2.05: The Rescue of a Twin._

_Kansas City, Missouri, US._

 

_The Flop._

_The Turn._

_The River._

_They were the three steps in turning over the card sequence in a Poker game round, or in more popular terms, the beginning, middle, and end. To _   
_describe_   
_ how everything has turned out to be, my situation in finding my brother was now on the 'turn' and heading towards 'the river'. Saying that I was worried was actually an understatement._

_I was terrified._

_Terrified that with the many 'what if(s)' or anything that could happen to screw up my plans to rescue my twin and the fact if I failed, my twin's life _   
_was_   
_ on the line. It was final, and if I made any mistakes here I don't think this regret would be one I'd likely forget for the rest of my life._

_The speed Sunstreaker was going did not help much to calm my nerves down. But I was thankful for it, even if I knew my body was screaming inwardly for its survival. All that was in my mind was finding my missing twin. My missing part of myself, the other half that made us whole as a family._

_Not to mention I felt Steve's pain._

_This time the drive was way faster than any conventional car could drive around. _   
_Despite the Autobot's speed remaining on average the highest he could reach without me fainting, we made_   
_ what usually would take about four hours from Springfield to Kansas City in barely two hours._

_While Uncle Neil's information clearly stated that Steve was in the industrial area, I made a quick trip to Steve's apartment. I was hoping that nothing in it was untouched. If it was true that the organization was dead on in wanting to know whether Steve was the hacker who defended NEST they were bound to start digging for clues. But Steve wasn't stupid when it went to keeping things safe. My twin's a thief as well, and I was certain he hid his most important possession before he went to the expo with Natalie._

_His laptop._

_Most of the data of the hacking was there and I was going to make sure I got my hands on it before any of those greedy people or any sort of authority had their hands on it. When I came into his apartment, it was a FREAKING mess. The whole place was searched by whoever had gotten Steve._

_I knew I was running out of time._

_Hang in there, bro._

_I'm coming._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

Small tables were overturned, books heaped in untidy stacks, furniture torn apart or not where they're supposed to be. Pretty much everything else had been scattered everywhere, all over the place. Astonishingly, the landlord had no idea it was in a mess, not to mention the bills were actually paid for. It was a smart thing that whoever wanted to know about his bother had been quiet in making sure that no one knew the place had been searched.

Skyler looked around with worry, noting all of the things they had taken.

So far, his bother's CPU was absent, including the LCD monitor. Even the television and other electronics were missing. If the cops had come in, they'd only suspect it was a regular burglary. He knew for one that Steve didn't have many things with him. The bedroom was also in a mess, but Skyler did not spend much time there, either. He needed get Steve's laptop from its secret hiding place.

The kitchen.

Yes, while many people hide their precious things in living rooms, study rooms and even in their bedroom, the kitchen is not a place many people would suspect, as many people - whether they are a part of the household or guests - come by to cook, grab a snack or eat. This kitchen was pretty normal for an apartment, the most unique thing was the landlord had some obsession with the 'Zen' stuff, so part of the wall by the built-in oven was covered with smooth stones. Knowing which rock was a fake and a button, Skyler pressed it, and it revealed a floor tile that was under the bin when closed.

Under the hidden tile was a small box that held an 11 inch screen laptop and external drive, along with various fake IDs Steve used.

Steve was never into big things, so the smaller the gadget, the more he actually took care of it.

Sighing in relief that the data was safe and the laptop was left untouched, he immediately grabbed one of Steve's remaining small bags in the room, put all the box's contents in, then made his way out of the apartment, locking Steve's door on the way. It wasn't hard for him to pick a door lock, so it was an easy task of re-locking it. It was a good thing there weren't security cameras in the apartment, the authorities didn't need to know he was here. For now, having the data was enough.

Blending in with the other people around the neighborhood, Skyler swiftly made his way back to Sunstreaker, who was now in a black Honda Civic alt-form. Perhaps wearing a disguise was a wise choice, seeing as his brother's place was in a mess there was no doubt the executors who barged into Steve's apartment would most likely expect him to come to the city. It was clear that disguises and diversions were now compulsory. He got in, closed the door and immediately touched the wheel to let the Autobot know they were leaving.

"Got your brother's laptop?" Sunstreaker asked.

Skyler nodded. "Yeah. But looks like whoever got him ransacked the place. I don't think they were ordinary criminals. We're lucky to find Steve's laptop untouched. I suppose they were trying to dig for more info."

"Why would a bunch of human criminals want your brother? I understand why the Decepticons would want you both since you're now a threat to their Intel," Sunstreaker voiced out. "It's not like you've done anything to the humans."

The con man sighed with a huff. "Any greedy person would like us for their own benefit, to try and scam the government." A pause. "It's not like the government is clean from its bad insides. Naturally if you hack for information in the right places there's plenty of blackmail material around." He then added, "Crime syndicates use blackmailing to survive. The government can't get their hands on them by law, since the government at times does break their own laws."

"Hmph," the Autobot grunted. That certainly explained how those con men existed, there was already a problem in the law system. "Do you have any idea where Steve might be?"

"Uncle Neil's Intel mentioned a group being held hostage in the old industrial area," Skyler said, indicating the spot on the paper map of Kansas City he had opened. "According to the map it's not far from where we are. But oddly enough there's a lot of traffic. It shouldn't take us long to get there, however."

Sunstreaker, noting that the road was getting crowded as he grew closer to their destination noticed something on his scanners. "We got authorities surrounding the place. There's a road diversion at the front. It's blocked."

Skyler blinked. "Huh?" His brows scrunched up in confusion. "You think you can scan the area? How many blockades are there?"

Doing so, the warrior bot stretched his scanners. What he found made him sure something was out of hand. "Skyler?"

"What is it?"

"It seems like a whole area is closed off. Not to mention the snipers on top of the buildings," Sunstreaker said, explaining his findings with a hint of discontent. "What now?"

_Snipers in the middle of the city area?_

_Oh, crap._

_That can't be good…_

Upon hearing the new information, Skyler reset his course. "Head towards the diverted road. If we're close enough we can ask what's going on."

"You're sure about this?" the bot asked hesitantly. He was worried that the more interaction with authorities, the bigger the chance they would get in more danger later.

Skyler was slightly nervous. "I mean- Sunstreaker- How often do you have snipers in the middle of the urban area that are from the law enforcement? It's either some important dude like the president giving the orders or there's some big shit going on." The young man looked around the area. "I have a feeling it's the latter."

The Autobot checked his scanners again. "Heh, looks like I have to agree with you, human. Seems like there's evacuations of civilians in the area."

As they got close enough to an officer that was guarding the area, Skyler rolled the window down and inquired about what was actually going on. Both the young con man and warrior bot did not like what they heard.

"Sorry sir, you're going to have to turn around here, there's a hostage situation in those buildings. Apparently there's a bomb planted as well," the police officer said. "A terrorist group's demanding some hackers show themselves by breaking the code they implanted in the bomb. This area's off limits to civilians."

Skyler's eye went wide as he froze.

_WHAT?_

__

* * *

 

"Steve?" Natalie looked at the other worriedly. "Are you alright?"

A slow reply. "Not…really," Steve said still trying to get used to the world of consciousness. The room continued to spin before his eyes. "…I heard everything, though."

Steve eyed Darren and Freddy warily - both of them were staring at their own computer monitors. While the guards of the place had been drastically decreased, he was certain they were watching from afar, making sure the hackers would do their job while under pressure.

_And, boy, _   
_were they_   
_ under pressure._

As having their own lives at stake last night had failed to draw out any confessions on whether they could decode or hack into the government, this morning they went on full assault. The hackers that had been eliminated as possibilities were taken and declared to be sacrifices, each wearing a vest with explosives tied to their bodies. A whole building block was declared as an explosion fest. The trigger was a timer, but the password was encoded in the style only Steve and Skyler knew. All four of them were cuffed on one hand, the chain tightly bound to steel chairs cemented to the floor.

_If that wasn't enough…_

Their kidnappers had planted a few bombs to start a fire in the area, and the clock was now ticking away. It seemed that whoever wanted the hackers were ready to kill their hostages if none of them happened to be who they were looking for. To any of those who were in the four steel seats, watching a large projector screen in front of them that gave a full view of their fellow hostages, it was a deadly situation. There was little hope for them, unless the real hackers came in and miraculously broke the codes. People's lives were at stake, including many innocents dwelling nearby.

Steve looked very carefully behind him under the pretense of stretching. Apparently there were only three goons guarding them. If anything, he wanted them out of there. Then he could take a chance and make his move. However, he was pondering on the chances he'd get caught and they would probably find out who he was right away.

_Think! Think! Think! What would Skyler do in this situation?_

Of course, he wasn't as creative as Skyler when it came to ideas, but he was the more practical type. At this point the chance of survival wasn't his alone. He knew it was time to seek help from the others. Not only to save himself, but he had to get the others out.

"Yo! Jeph!" Phil said as he showed his comm. link. "The communications are busted, man!"

Jeph checked his comm., testing it to find out his partner's words were true. "Got no reception or any response from Shawn on the outer perimeter. The cops couldn't have gotten here yet. These dweebs haven't even started typing!"

"Alright, you two. We head out and try to get in touch with the other guys and the boss." Marco ordered.

"What about those hackers?" Phil asked.

Marco rolled his eyes. "It's not like they can run away, they're cuffed to the spot and the car we stole didn't even have anything that worked to make it move. Get going!"

And with that they went out.

Seeing this as a chance to start his plan, Steve got everyone's attention, "Let's all try and break the code."

Darren, a very large bulky brunette guy, looked at Steve skeptically. "We only know how it partially works! Even if we did try it out countless times, we barely scratched the surface of the codes."

"It's way too hard!" The youngest shook his head. Freddy was only sixteen, his fear overwhelming him. "We'll never make it in time!"

Natalie, the girl with chestnut short wavy hair, looked at her partner with worry. "Steve-"

"We have to," Steve said evenly. "If we don't, many people are going to die. Those idiots are gone for now. Work with me! If we can figure out the codes, we'll all get out of this alive. If we don't-"

"You don't have to tell us," Darren interrupted. "We know." He set his hands on the keyboard, "Well, let's try it out. We've got barely an hour before everyone goes 'kaboom' and we're human steaks."

Freddy still looked uncertainly at Steve. "But what if we don't make it?"

"We won't know until we try," Natalie pointed out, backing up her friend.

Steve smiled at that. "Thanks, Nat."

"Don't mention it, I'm way ahead of you," the girl said as she had her hands on the keyboard, and she looked at the teen. "Give it a go, Freddy. We'll need all the help we can."

"Um- Okay, uh. I'll try it," the youngest gulped.

Finally Steve gave the command. "Let's go!"

Simultaneously, all the hackers started to type in hopes of breaking the codes to the best of their abilities. For this time, it was probably the first time in their life there was a lot at stake on their shoulders if they lost.

Behind them, Sideswipe watched with astonishment as the human Steve led his fellow hackers to try whatever they had in breaking the code. His courage had managed to give a bit of hope to the others. The Autobot was able to move again now as his systems had told him that his body wasn't locked anymore. However, he did get some minor dents thanks to Marco and his buddies, who had struck him in the same spots over and over as they had little success in trying to get to his driver's wheel. Seeing the situation was rather dire, Sideswipe let the humans keep on typing in hopes to break the code. He didn't necessarily need to expose his bi-pedal form unless there was a chance the building would collapse, something he was hoping wouldn't happen. Yet something bothered him deeply…

_The communications of the human guards being wiped out seemed disturbingly familiar._

Sideswipe found he had guessed right when he then scanned out to find jamming frequencies in the area. They weren't strong enough to wipe out the computers the hackers were working on or even his own communication systems. All the same, it was a Decepticon signature.

:: Sideswipe to Big Boss. ::

:: Optimus Prime here. Hear you loud and clear, Sideswipe. We're on route to Kansas City. ::

That surprised the warrior bot a great deal. :: What's the big rush? ::

:: Several of the human media sources have reported the hackers are being held hostage. Are they true? :: the Prime asked.

:: Half true, sir. Four of them are still in the main base in front of me. There are a few small explosives around the building - enough to spark fire but not completely blow up the whole place at once. The crime syndicate plans to pressure them into breaking the codes. :: Sideswipe reported what was happening on his side.

:: Are your systems working properly now? ::

:: Yes, sir. ::

:: Very well. Keep an eye on the hackers from where you are; the Autobot team has been split into two groups. They were both sent in advance to Kansas City. Sergeant Epps is headed towards the buildings where the hostages are with Jazz, Jolt, Chromia, Arcee, and Flare up. Major Lennox is with Ironhide, Red Alert, and Prowl; they are heading your way. :: Optimus quickly explained the situation. :: With me are Ratchet, Mirage, and Hound. ::

The idea everyone was here left a bitter feeling in his spark that he wasn't able to complete his mission on his own. But he had something important to report. :: Big Boss? I think we have bad company. The guards left because their communications are being jammed. ::

:: Have you analyzed the frequency, Sideswipe? :: the Prime questioned.

:: It's a 'Con alright. :: Sideswipe said with distaste. :: But the jamming signal is weak. I have a feeling it may be one of Soundwave's little critter drones. ::

This of course made the Prime caution his occasionally impetuous soldier. :: Keep your guard up, Sideswipe. There's a good chance there are more Decepticons heading your way. Make sure to get the humans out of the way should you engage them. Optimus out. ::

:: Yes, sir. Sideswipe out. ::

* * *

A chance to finally make a move.

It was time to hunt some fleshlings down.

And of course get his main confirmed target.

Without much effort, Laserbeak with swift and stealthy ease glided down to the now empty area of the industry storage facility. The area was deserted as most if not nearly all of those primitive brained insects had focused themselves on the main event in the city area. At least the job was going to be far easier than the spy expected. The only problem he was most likely to face was inside.

The Autobot.

Laserbeak was not stupid when it came to dealing with the twins. Even one of them was capable of fighting five Decepticons and still end up victorious. It was the reason why many Decepticons would prefer fighting the other bots of their opposing faction; they both weren't the types to give any mercy. Especially the elder twin; he had a reputation of 'corpses first, talk later'. While it was odd that he was an Autobot with that attitude, he had harbored no decisions of joining into the Decepticons.

No matter.

Sunstreaker was dead.

It wasn't like this one was going to last for long after the other was dead. Laserbeak figured it was better to just grab whichever fleshling was the hacker and give the darn insect to Megatron like he was ordered. Like his master Soundwave had said, engaging the scum in a fight wasn't really a wise choice. Ending up dead like Ravage wasn't really appealing to him.

But first…

He needed to put a few insects out of their miserable puny lives.

His intended target came on cue. This particular one was in charge of guarding the outer perimeter of the buildings. Laserbeak waited patiently before he stealthy hopped within the shadows of whatever there was to cover his presence. With this one dead, it was only a matter of time before he could advance further in. He deliberately flicked a stone at the man's feet, then waited for his reaction.

The red-eyed hunter sneered when the human caught the attention and walked to where he was, pointing a gun.

_Foolish insect._

When the human was at the spot, Laserbeak moved with a blur, retracting some of his bladed wings.

The guard only stood in fear as he was confronted by a gigantic metallic falcon with bladed wings and red eyes. He shoved his arms in front of him to aim his gun.

To find out they were gone.

They were cleanly cut and on the floor leaking with red ooze.

Before the human could react or scream, Laserbeak with blinding speed pecked at the human's neck, cracking it to make an instantaneous kill.

Letting go of the insect in his beak, the Decepticon spy looked with predatory blood-lust at the building.

_One down._

_Plenty more to slaughter._

__

* * *

 

Sunstreaker grumbled his vents on the side of the road.

_Why do I have to be the one waiting?_

_Oh, yeah. I don't FIT in those puny buildings!_

The Autobot was pissed that Skyler had made the decision to try and rescue the fleshlings trapped inside the building, even though they had already confirmed that his brother was not with the other hackers. Shouldn't the human go after his own twin? What significance were the other hackers to him? Well, it wasn't like Sunstreaker had a choice in not following the human who was his guide as well his link to the fleshlings that his brother was with. The thought of parting with Skyler weighed heavy on the bot. Not only did the human have extended resources and links, he considered Sunstreaker a brother, despite their many differences.

At least the human was kind enough to leave a walkie talkie inside his interior if anything happened.

The frequency was set by the Autobot so no other human frequency could try and get in. Sunstreaker was on the task as a lookout if anyone got near the area.

_Hurry up, human. I hate waiting._

After an easy task of scanning and other ways of getting around the blockade, and avoiding getting seen by snipers with Sunstreaker's help, Skyler was in an empty building that housed the electricity currents connected to the building the terrorists were using. He rapidly opened his laptop and managed to connect into the main security system of the place where the hackers were held. It wasn't difficult for Skyler to get into the connection as the buildings around the block area were connected to each other through the same system. The difficult part was avoiding the eyes of the cops and security cameras.

On his way, Skyler managed to shut a few of the cameras down, even erasing the backup recordings. He wasn't going to risk any more exposure, especially if these crooks had his brother. Sunstreaker may have not understood why he was risking himself in trying to help the other hackers, but Skyler just wanted to make up for the fact that their lives just weren't worth sacrificing for what he was responsible for. So what if they got interrogated by the police later on, at least they'd still be able to live normal lives despite the galactic war of alien robots right under their noses.

Even if he did managed to rescue Steve right away and ran for it, Skyler was very sure the news of the other hackers that died because of him would make him suffer more survivors' guilt. The deaths of his parents and his sister had been hard enough, he did not want to add more to the list.

~( Human, what are you doing right now? )~ A comm. came over the walkie talkie. ~( You done yet? )~ the usual impatient voice said.

Skyler rolled his eyes. ~( I've not even started yet, Sunstreaker. I just got into the security system of the area. Anything happening outside? )~

~( Nothing. )~ Sunstreaker said with a bored tone. ~( Looks like those fleshlings have a leash on the law enforcement about coming near the building. The streets are deserted. )~

~( Could you get anything from your scanners about what's going on inside the buildings? )~ the con man asked, typing away on his laptop inside the security system, having made sure his presence was not known by those controlling the surveillance of the building.

The Autobot couldn't see how that was important, but replied anyway. ~( Too many floors, human. I only can pinpoint how many humans in the building, not where they are precisely. )~

~( Every detail counts. )~ Skyler reminded. ~( If it's not precise then, give me an estimation. )~

Thinking he may have missed something, Sunstreaker asked, ~( What are you trying to do human? )~

~( Get those hackers out. )~ the young man replied. ~( If it's true the bomb's encoded with the hacking type I did with Steve, I'll have to decode it. )~

~( Skyler, I thought we're going to get your twin first! )~ the bot complained.

~( If my brother isn't there, then there's no doubt he's somewhere else. Steve wouldn't have wanted those other hackers dead either just because of what we did. )~ the human disagreed.

~( And their lives are worth more than your twin? )~ Sunstreaker ridiculed.

Skyler said with a stern voice, ~( Wrong. There's no such thing as an insignificant life. Theirs, my twin's or yours, I- )~ the young man paused catching his breath. ~( I don't want to regret if I got a chance to save their lives but I didn't use it. The worst thing a con man could ever do is to pass a chance when the time comes. So, Sunstreaker, _please_ pinpoint their location.)~

The Autobot was shocked._ This human in particular kept on surprising him._

~( Ugh. )~ Sunstreaker growled. ~( About thirty humans or so - hostages, I think - are in the middle of the building. Those fleshbags who are carrying weapons with them are on the top floor. )~

~( Thank you- )~

~( Don't mention it, human, and I mean it. )~ Sunstreaker grumbled with reluctance. ~( I'm only agreeing so you can get this over with. )~

Skyler looked at the walkie talkie, ~( I'll be done in a few minutes. )~ Knowing that his time was going to be short, he immediately hacked into the bomb systems the hostages were wearing.

What he found stunned him.

There were four sources of encryption that were trying to break the encoding. One style in particular he recognized without doubt.

It was Steve.

His twin was fighting this battle, too.

He was about to contact his brother via their code when he abruptly stopped, realizing something.

_Why was Steve hacking together with three other hackers at the same time?_

It then hit him.

His brother was still hiding his identity; he must have requested the others to go in at the same time so there was less of a chance to be spotted. Skyler knew at this rate it was a bad idea to join in, as he would be detected as an external force by the crime syndicate terror group. He wiped sweat from his face, quickly thinking up some sort of way he could help his brother without interfering with the decoding attempts as he noted that the coding through his program analysis told him that if he did interfere it would cut off time to the explosives. If he couldn't join in the internal battle, he might as well make it external.

External it is.

Opening up Uncle Nagel's hacking software, Skyler fingers blurred as he typed on the laptop. Hopefully whatever he was doing would be able to get their attention. First if not foremost, he overrode the security of the entire block area in the background. He soon got access to the security cameras that pointed to the middle floors of the building.

Soon the picture of eleven hostages and about ten people in black clothes with masks covering their faces came into view. They were in the lobby area, not anywhere near any windows to keep snipers from seeing them.

Smart.

But not smart enough.

Not wanting to make any bold attempts to the people in the security section, he fiddled with the elevators, making the doors close and open, accompanied by strange sounds. With caution and curiosity the ten people looked warily at the elevators. Then there was reporting going on through their receiver. What Skyler did note, however, was that they used some sort of Morse code that was embedded into the security system. The con man smiled as he found the codes with little effort. He sent a code that all members were to head for the top of the tower.

Stupidly, they complied and used the elevators.

And when they were all in, Skyler simply locked the elevators between floors so there was little chance that they'd get out. That took care one group; it was time to deal with the rest. Best thing was the building he had hacked belonged to some sort of small tech company, which made Skyler's job far easier as nearly the whole building was controlled by computers. It wasn't really much of a hassle to lock the people controlling the security area in their room and their boss – who happened to be on the top most floor – in his. Even the fire escape stairs were mostly computer oriented.

They were trapped.

Skyler released a relieved sigh since the danger was mostly gone. Now, he needed to get the hostages out. Noticing an electronic advertisement board in the room they were in, the young con man messaged them with a replaying text in a loop saying:

**'YOUR CAPTORS ARE TEMPORARILY TRAPPED. USE THE FIRE EXIT TO GO DOWN &amp; ESCAPE. BE CAREFUL NOT TO IGNITE THE BOMBS YOU'RE WEARING. YOUR FRIENDS ARE TRYING TO DECODE THE BOMBS. – _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_'**

Once Skyler was sure the other hackers had gotten the message he sent them and were convinced he was one of the true 'Furta duo' hackers, he waited a few tense minutes while they headed for the fire exits. He hoped that everything would go smoothly and his twin would see it happening and be able to escape as well. He closed his laptop and shut it off. The con man believed that he could leave the rest to his brother. Since Steve had been trying to decode the bombs without an IP geo-coding random locater, the coordinates to where his brother was rested in his hand and he typed it into his GPS to pinpoint the exact location.

~( Sunstreaker, you there? )~

~( About time, human. )~ Sunstreaker said. ~( You succeeded? )~

~( Yeah. )~ Skyler said, adding with urgency, ~( Can you pick me up? I got Steve's exact coordinates. We're heading over to the industrial area. )~

Sunstreaker had to admit he was proud to hear the young man had succeeded in hacking a whole building security. However, with the news of the human's twin's location, Sunstreaker roared his engines to life and headed towards where the human was waiting.

The Autobot only hoped that after everything Skyler had done that there was still enough time to rescue Steve.

* * *

**'YOUR CAPTORS ARE TEMPORARILY TRAPPED. USE THE FIRE EXIT TO GO DOWN &amp; ESCAPE. BE CAREFUL NOT TO IGNITE THE BOMBS YOU'RE WEARING. YOUR FRIENDS ARE TRYING TO DECODE THE BOMBS. – _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_'**

_Skyler's here! He's here!_

Steve and the other three that had been trying to decode the bombs couldn't believe their eyes when they saw the electronic advertisement looping the message over and over. It was hope for them that their friends were able to escape the crime organization people currently trapped in the building. It served them right and now the four of them were more motivated than ever to break the code. Even better, the guards had mysteriously disappeared. They needed all the motivation they could get as the air was getting thicker with smoke by the minute.

To their utter horror, the flame ignitions had turned on.

It was a race against time.

The building was burning.

Steve looked worriedly as their youngest companion was coughing more than they were. He knew they were drastically running out of time. They all had to get out soon, or they were doomed. The con man looked to his partner in crime as he spotted something.

"Natalie, your hair clip!" Steve shouted. "Can you pick your cuff lock and ours?"

Natalie's eye went wide with realization. "Yes! Ok- ok- Hold on. I'll be with you guys in a second."

At times like this, Steve couldn't be happier that he and Natalie were con men with thief skills.

_Thanks to Uncle Rusty they knew the best lock picking skills._

While they kept on trying to decode the bombs, Steve spoke, "Darren, how are you doing?"

"I feel like shit," he admitted as he answered his fellow hacker. "I've only decoded so little. I don't think I got anything to break all of these codes."

"Can I trust you with Freddy?"

This made Freddy stop typing but he was still coughing, "S-Steve?"

"It's opened!" Natalie cheered. She then went to Freddy's lock immediately. "Hold still."

Darren didn't like where this was going. "What are you-"

"I'm staying behind," Steve interrupted. "I think I know how to break these codes down. I'm entrusting Freddy to you."

"But the building's tearing down!" Darren argued.

"Look- The hacker _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_ saved our other hacker friends, but it's not over yet. If I don't decode this, they die and all our efforts would be for nothing," Steve shot back. "Freddy, you have asthma. You have to get out of here first; Natalie and I will follow you guys later."

His twin had managed to save the other hackers, it was his responsibility as _RecordatioFurtaCorona2_ to finish things off.

Natalie then jogged over to Darren to unlock his cuff as Freddy stood up from his seat.

Sideswipe's alert systems of danger rang in his processor, and he watched as the first two that were unlocked eventually gave up the argument and left the premises, leaving him with the other two hackers to worry about. He silently prayed that the human succeeded in breaking the code. The smoke and dust inside the building was getting thicker. Amazingly, the computers that signaled the trigger for the bombs were miraculously still functioning, perhaps the underground wiring made it possible to keep functioning as it had its own energy supply that was not attached to the building engulfed with flames.

As Steve's cuff was unlocked, Sideswipe was amazed that this human somehow figured out the codes and he was unlocking the clips that held the vests of the hostages quickly.

"Steve!" Natalie shouted worriedly. "We have to get out NOW!"

"Just another three more levels!" Steve shouted back. "I haven't gotten to the part where the explosives are deactivated completely! Natalie, you have to get out now!"

"Not without you!" Natalie protested.

The con man shook his head. "No, you have to get to my twin, Skyler! Tell him to meet me on the other side of the building near the abandoned smelter chimney!"

Before Natalie could say anything, he held his hand up.

"Please, Natalie. You got to go," Steve said softly. "Your uncle wouldn't forgive me if anything happened to you."

She felt like her insides churned. _It was her fault __for__ investigating the stupid mark!_ She held the tears back from her eyes as she nodded reluctantly, making her way to where the others headed while she kept an eye back to her partner in crime.

Steve returned to his computer, coughing as he entered the last codes.

_   
**Explosives Fully Deactivated.**   
_

Just as he was going to breathe out in relief that it was over, a horrible screeching sound came from behind him.

Sideswipe's systems switched between the assault and defensive modes immediately as he went active. He clearly knew who it was.

Steve looked over, only to fall on his rear as the wall crashed down, revealing a metallic bird-like predator with red glowing eyes.

The con man looked to Natalie and screamed, "RUN!" Despite this, his friend only stood there, locked in fear.

Shaking his head, Steve stumbled back as best he could, but eventually couldn't move, clearly locked into fright as well.

_Sharp talons lunged at him…_

Natalie screamed, "STEVE!"

_HOLY SHIT!_

__

* * *

 

Sunstreaker heeded all the directions the human gave.

He couldn't help but panic as well, but kept it hidden from the human as at this rate, Skyler wasn't in a condition to think as clearly as he should be. The bot noted this when the human made a few mistakes about taking turns on the roads. Skyler wasn't your typical human to make mistakes.

"Human?" Sunstreaker asked. "You alright?"

The human was silent.

"Skyler?"

There wasn't a reaction from him as he was in a trance.

This time as he scanned the human, Sunstreaker said louder, "Skyler, what is WRONG with YOU?"

The method worked and the human was snapped back to reality, but Sunstreaker did not like it when the human shivered more than he had expected, though his scanners indicated it was from fear. The bot knew it wasn't Skyler's fear as he was nowhere near any sort of extreme danger. It had to be his twin's.

A choke came out, "Sunstreaker-"

"I know. On it," the bot cut off, letting the human ease down. "I get how you feel."

Skyler was speechless as the Autobot took in his fear. If there was anything to being a con man, the thing he hated the most was to show signs of weakness. Yet he guessed the bot understood him when it came to being the eldest of siblings, that he knew how the twin thing worked was a plus. He prayed that they'd get there in time.

_Hang on, Steve._

_I'm nearly there._

__

* * *

 

"_**CLANG!"**_

Steve covered his head as the clash of the huge metallic echo shook the area and felt like someone turned on large amplifiers as it resonated to his heart. Noticing he wasn't feeling any pain, he cracked an eye open, then two.

He literally gaped at what he saw.

Obviously he wasn't dreaming - the metallic bird was still looking at him hungrily with predatory red eyes. What he did not expect was to have a silver robot about fifteen feet tall, carrying huge twin blades, protecting him from the blow of the bird's talons.

Despite the fact adrenaline was pumping through his blood system, he couldn't move.

_Oh God, oh God, OH MY GOD!_

"RUN, HUMAN!" Sideswipe shouted.

Steve barely managed to scramble to his legs before he fell was far too confused to comprehend anything, even the fact that this other robot that had blue optics was trying to get him out of harm's way. Regretfully, he was locked to the spot. The hacker eyed the battle warily as he turned to see that Natalie had somehow managed to run to safety. Back to the battle, the two robotic beings clashed with each other for dominance but it was clear that the metallic bird was outmatched.

Observing that it was far safer to get away from the two giants, Steve focused himself to get his legs moving. However as he stood up, it was getting difficult to breathe. He ended up crawling on all fours through the combusted air, coughing hard.

Laserbeak back away, realizing he had no chance of winning against the Autobot warrior. At least he was almost certain that the human by the name of Steve Knight was able to crack the codes of the human hackers that blocked his master. Time would tell whether he was actually one of the hackers, for the Decepticons planned on breaching NEST very soon. With a fierce screech that made the Autobot wince as his audio receptors rang, Laserbeak retreated, hopping as he spread his wings, then flew out of the building. It would be best to leave the city before more Autobots arrived.

Sideswipe growled, "Lousy buzzbeak." The coward drone would most likely report this incident to Soundwave. Just as he was about to complain more, the warrior heard coughing noises, drawing his attention back to the human that was on the floor struggling to breathe.

Steve's eyes watered. He was in need of oxygen, badly. At this point he couldn't fully stay awake anymore and his body collapsed on the ground. All he could remember was the sight of two large blue optics staring down at him before the world went black.

The bot made no hesitations in grabbing the human and tucking it into his interior as the whole place was starting to crumble down. Once he was fully ready in his alt-mode, he sped his tires until they squealed on the floor and jumped out of the hole that the 'Con made as the whole building finally gave out.

"That was way too close," Sideswipe muttered.

"Skyler…" the human inside him mumbled weakly.

As he drove out, Sideswipe reprimanded himself as he scanned the human, hoping that he wasn't injured that badly. There were various injuries - bruises, cuts and, so forth - and his sensors indicated the human inhaled too much carbon dioxide in his respiration systems. He quickly made a call to the closest medic he could get to.

:: Sideswipe to Red Alert. ::

:: Red Alert, responding :: the younger medic answered.

:: I have an injured human inside me that's presumably one of the hackers. :: Sideswipe reported. :: Where's your location? ::

:: Heading your way, but perhaps it's best to treat his injuries in a secluded place away from any dangerous area. I'll send you the coordinates. :: Red Alert replied. :: Send in the health scans you've done to me 'Swipe. I'll need the data to treat the human. ::

Sideswipe did what he was told and wondered about the location of the coordinates, :: Red, isn't this place a bit out of town? ::

:: Got orders from Prime. :: the other said lightly. :: Red Alert out ::

The warrior bot had to stop himself from rolling his eyes. He sighed; he had some issues when it came to medics. Speaking of medics, he was in deep slagging trouble with the 'Hatchet' and he knew it. _Oh, Primus._ He was officially screwed! Not only did he bring an injured human, but he forced himself through the twin bond that Ratchet had strictly forbid him to.

_Frag it._

:: Optimus Prime to Sideswipe ::

:: Sideswipe here, sir. ::

:: There is news that the explosives attached to the hostages were fully deactivated. Which of the hackers is responsible? ::

:: I've got the hacker, sir. :: Sideswipe reported. :: He's injured and unconscious; most injuries are due to the crime syndicates' interrogation he was submitted to. I'm on my way to Red Alert's meeting point. ::

The Prime noted this and then he asked :: Did you encounter any Decepticons? ::

There was a growl coming from the warrior bot's side, :: Got into a fight with Laserbeak. The rusty drone was after the human hacker who succeeded in breaking the codes. ::

:: And what of the other three other hackers you reported? ::

:: They all escaped. :: Sideswipe said. :: The hacker that's with me stayed behind to make sure he decoded all the codes until the explosives was fully deactivated. ::

:: What is the human's name and how old is he? :: the Prime asked.

:: Steve Knight. 21 years old, sir. ::

This surprised the Autobot commander, as the hacker was probably just a year older than Sam. The fact that he broke the codes of the hackers who had blocked the breach into NEST was something that would change his life forever. :: Bring Steve to the rendezvous point immediately. Ironhide is already enroute to the industrial area with Major Lennox to cover the place. Prowl and Simmons are on the other side of the town to fix any problems that the other hacker has caused. ::

:: Other hacker? :: Sideswipe asked.

:: It seems the real hacker who blocked the breach, _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1,_ came in, and locked the crime syndicate in the building in the lifts and various rooms. :: Optimus explained. :: He/she was responsible for freeing the hostages from the building. ::

:: Did they find the hacker? :: Sideswipe asked curiously.

:: By Prowl's report, it seems not. :: The Prime said. :: I'll be with you in three hours. Prime out. ::

:: Yes, sir. Sideswipe out. ::

The Autobot swerved to the next street over by taking a shortcut to where the medic was. The mission wasn't so bad since he had a hacker with him, although the part where Steve's twin was most likely looking for him made Sideswipe a bit sorry for the human that they were going to be separated.

Sideswipe shook himself out of it.

He was only following orders.

But on the inside he was seeing himself being separated from his twin Sunstreaker that fateful day on the battlefield.

* * *

"Steve!"

"Steve!"

"Steve!"

Skyler's heart was racing.

_Am I too late?_

"Steve!" he yelled until his voice was hoarse, looking for his twin in the burning buildings that were not too far away. He desperately called his brother again but received no reply. Frantically he walked around to find anything that would lead to his twin. The air was boiling hot as the building previously serving as the main base of the terrorist group was burning in a steady but fiery blaze.

The con man jogged around the street to find a bloody corpse of man.

Skyler regretted what he saw and turned away.

He nearly threw up.

What normal sane person wouldn't when they saw a body with arms cleanly cut on the floor with his head turned to 360 degrees. The smell was making him feel worse. Skyler stumbled over to a wall to focus his bearings again.

_Holy crap, what was THAT?_

It made him panic more as something might have happened to Steve. Yet his thoughts were focused on what had happened to the man. Then, there was something else on the other side of the building on the floor. Skyler thought it was another body, but it turned out it was an unconscious girl. As he focused his eyes he realized who it was.

"Natalie!" Skyler yelled, running to her unconscious form. "Natalie! Are you okay?" He shook her a few times, then decided she was going to be out for some time.

"Human, have you found your brother?" Sunstreaker said, now in his bi-pedal form.

"No, but I found Natalie, who was supposed to be with him," the young man indicated the girl in his arms. "What are you doing out of alt-mode?"

Seeing the bot's twin blades out of their normal sheathed position made the human cautious.

"There are dead human bodies all over this forsaken place. All the dead ones are those crime syndicate members," Sunstreaker replied. "Whoever did it is gone." He transformed back to his Honda Civic alt-mode. "Never hurts being prepared."

"Uh…"

Skyler's attention went back to the girl, "Natalie? You ok?"

Natalie tried to see who it was, and realized the person was in a disguise of some sort. "…Steve?"

The con man shook his head. "No, I'm Skyler. Where's Steve?"

In an instant she grabbed onto Skyler in a hug. He nearly fell down under the sudden shift of her weight.

"Whoa!" said the elder twin in shock. "What happened? Where's my brother?"

"Skyler- He- There was this huge robot thing and-"

Even though his heart was sinking to the bottom of the pit of his stomach, he needed to know more. He put his hand on her shoulder and looked into her eyes. "What did it look like? Can you describe it to me? Easy, nice slow breaths."

She calmed herself down but tears were already flowing out. "There was this really huge robot bird with red eyes- He attacked Steve and-" she choked again as she coughed, trying to clear her throat.

Skyler felt like someone just punched him in the gut. _Shit, a Decepticon attacked Steve? Shit, shit, shit!_

Sunstreaker who was near them was dangerously growling without making an effort to quiet down. _The 'aft Laserbeak killed those other humans._

"…but- another one- hic- saved him- it was silver- had blue eyes- had two blades- changed from Corvette Stingray-"

"**WHAT?"**

Of course, the mysterious voice coming from nowhere shocked the human girl. Skyler, however, knew who it was.

"What happened then?" the con man pressed, drawing Natalie's attention away from Sunstreaker.

She shook her head to focus. "They fought, but the bird flew away. All I remember after that was the whole building collapsed and Steve was taken by the silver robot."

This time Skyler felt weak, "He's gone? Steve's gone?"

_Damn it. I failed!_

_I FAILED!_

_What kind of older brother am I?_

_DAMN IT!_

_DAMN IT!_

Skyler gripped his hands until his fists were hard and white. He looked to the ground as he closed his eyes in frustration. If he'd only gotten here quicker! If only…he was here. If anything he hated about himself that day was being a complete jerk for not getting to his brother when he was in trouble fast enough. The con man felt sick like someone pushed aspirins down his throat, leaving a bitter aftertaste.

Sunstreaker, who had been watching the human's reaction upon finding that his twin was out of his reach, felt a horrible feeling in his spark. To him, watching Skyler like that was an unfriendly reminder of how he'd gotten separated from his own twin. While he'd always turned away from those who mourned a separation of a loved one, this time he couldn't. This was because he knew what it felt like. He quickly pondered on the mention of the other Autobot, could it possibly be his own twin? There was a rarity when it came to Autobots using blades.

The Autobot flashed his lights to get Skyler's attention.

Catching this, Skyler stood and said, "Natalie, I want to tell you something. It's important, so don't freak out too much, okay?"

She looked into Skyler's eyes, worried at first but nodded.

"Sunstreaker?" he looked to the car.

"Here, human."

Natalie nearly jumped as she heard the car speak.

"It's alright! He's friendly."

A snort came from the black Honda Civic.

Skyler held her. "Natalie, I won't let harm come to you. I want you to tell me if the car that was silver looks like the one we're looking right now. You understand?"

"Okay," she said softly as she fearfully watched the car.

"You can transform," Skyler said.

As Sunstreaker shifted and changed to his bi-pedal form Natalie couldn't believe the similarities between this robot and the silver one, now that she was seeing this one in its large 'humanoid' like form. Even the blades were the same. The only things that made him different were his car base form and color.

"Did the mech look like me?"

Not knowing what else to say, a small nervous squeak came out, "Yes…"

"Sides was here, then," Sunstreaker turned as he looked towards the building.

Natalie, completely confused, looked to Skyler for answers. "Skyler? What's going on? Why is this robot with you? Why-"

"He's an Autonomous Robotic Organism. Sunstreaker is mech, Steve and I did some hacking that caught their attention…" Skyler trailed off.

"You're _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_?" the chestnut haired girl disbelievingly asked. "Then Steve is-"

"_RecordatioFurtaCorona2." _The con man interrupted. "Did he stay behind to deactivate the hostages' explosives?"

"Yeah," She softly said. "But what's he doing with you?" Natalie pointed to the bot.

"That's none of your business, femme!" Sunstreaker said.

Natalie wasn't going to give up a fight. "Skyler's family!"

What surprised her and the bot was when Skyler stepped between them. "STOP IT! ENOUGH!"

Skyler tried calming himself down to no avail. When was the last time he lost control of his temper? He only remembered briefly that was during the funeral of his parents and sister.

"You're both family. Don't make this worse than it already is," Skyler sighed, staring to the ground as his face was still burning in anger. "Please understand, I just lost my twin."

The two first stared at each other before turning to the troubled twin.

Before there was any conversation that started between them, the sirens of police vehicles alerted them.

"Crap, the cops!" Skyler said.

Sunstreaker grumbled as he swiftly changed to his alt-form. "Hurry up! We need to get out of here!"

The con man made a swift grab for the girl but she held to her place.

"Natalie?"

Natalie looked at Skyler, "They're probably looking for the hackers who were held here. I'm going to stay."

"What? But-"

"Skyler! Steve wanted to come looking for you before he was taken. He knew you were looking for him!" Natalie protested. "You have to go. I'll buy you some time and I promise I won't tell anything about robots or that you guys were the real hackers."

"Natalie…"

She then looked to the car, "Sunstreaker?"

"What, femme?"

While it was odd to be called a 'femme', she only said, "If you're family to Skyler, you're family to me. Take care of him. Make sure he's safe."

Sunstreaker couldn't really believe the notion but replied with a huff, "Way ahead of you, femme." The fact she smiled and bowed to him afterwards made him uncomfortable.

_Was this how the Grifter family worked? He never expected this sort of reaction._

She hugged her grifter family member again and said, "I'll see you later, Sky. Keep searching for Steve. You'll find him, I'm sure of it."

"Thanks, be careful," Skyler said.

"You too."

And with that, she left towards the sirens. Skyler could only stare at her back hopelessly.

"Skyler-"

"I failed, Sunstreaker," the con man said bitterly. "I couldn't get to my twin in time."

Sunstreaker was quiet for a moment, then said, "You failed. But you don't regret the lives you saved. He's still alive and knew you were coming."

"But-"

"You did what was right, Skyler." Sunstreaker said, making sure the human got the message clearly. "You're strong."

Skyler was stunned at first. Yet, after a moment went by, he nodded and softly smiled, "Thanks, mech."

"Hurry up and get in!" the bot ushered the con man. The young man quickly got in and buckled his seat belt.

Sunstreaker sighed as he scanned the area to find the right streets to take in order to avoid being seen by any police cars. Even while he was doing this, his mind wondered on the last time he heard those words. It was ironic that they never came from a warrior. All those eons ago he was forced to face the facts that war was on his doorstep. It was those words that kept him alive and how he managed to protect his twin.

He wondered what his paint master would think of his situation right now.

* * *

Both the human and Cybertronian left the scene without a problem.

However, problems have a knack showing up when the least you suspected them to.

Sunstreaker abruptly stopped, forcing the human inside him to gag on his seat belt.

"Sunstreaker! What was that for?" Skyler complained.

"Scanner's shown something. Scrap! Ironhide's here!" Sunstreaker replied in a serious tone. "He's with his human partner as well."

The young man's jaw dropped, "WHAT? You don't think-"

"They must have detected the crime syndicate's hacking simulation system," Sunstreaker finalized.

Of course that wasn't the only thing he figured out, there were many things he wanted to know about how his faction was doing. The whole area was surrounded by a couple of more blockades. Slag all those humans! The only way out was through the weapon's specialist's road. Plus, detecting that sort of hacker simulation wasn't really Wheeljack's or Hound's style. He concluded that the Autobot Strategist, Prowl, was on Earth.

_Am I seriously going to go against ALL OF THEM?_

_My OWN Faction._

_Oh, PIT._

Sunstreaker feared that things didn't end up the way they did. "Human? It's better if we give in ourselves."

"Huh?" the human stared at the steering wheel, flabbergasted. "But what about Sideswipe? If Soundwave knows you're alive, even if I did reach my twin, Sideswipe will suffer for it!"

"But my brother took your twin!" the bot argued.

"Look- Sunstreaker-" Skyler said with a heave, "Whatever happened back there just happened. Alright? I don't blame Sideswipe at all, it's not his fault. Didn't we agree in the first place that we're going low profile?"

The Autobot growled, "You're safer with the Autobots as well!"

Skyler shook his head, "Even if we did get back with our twins, it doesn't solve how your spark isn't acting the way it should be to Sideswipe. What if there was a possibility that even your medic Ratchet doesn't know how to fix your condition? The only lead we have is Soundwave."

"Why are you so persistent, human?" Sunstreaker bickered back.

"Because your life and Sideswipe's life is on the line, and the only way to fix it is to get the 'Con officer and beat the living hell out of him!" the con man said with conviction. "We've gone this far and still managed to keep ourselves hidden. I'm not backing out now, not when the mech that gave me the chance to get back at the Decepticons and is willing to keep me safe even though his own life is in danger because of spark tampering. As long the chance is there, I'll take it, and make it work."

If Sunstreaker was a human, he would probably choke in embarrassment with all he just heard.

_How could he have been such an idiot?_

_He let fear _   
_get_   
_ to him!_

Sunstreaker was glad he had met with this stubborn human who was a con man.

_Did a human just remind me that there was always another way?_

_Pit, I'm giving up so easily. And I thought I was strong._

"Heh. Looks like my servos weren't working well, human," Sunstreaker admitted, none too easily. "I take my words back."

The young man smiled at the bot. "It's called freaking out, mech. We all have our times. You helped me, I help you back."

Sunstreaker cleared his processors and scanned the ones guarding the exit to the blockade again. "That's odd, there's some old fleshling asking for a private transport vehicle. Seems like the fleshling by the designation of 'Will' is arguing with him."

An idea came into Skyler's mind. "Sunstreaker, you and me, lookie-loo, now!"

"NO WAY!"

Skyler looked at the bot accusingly. "Sunstreaker, it's the only way out!"

_Scrap._

_Why _   
_does_   
_ Primus make me go through this?_

"Fine, human!" Sunstreaker cried out with regret. "But if we get caught, YOU'RE responsible for this!"

"If we do get caught, it's not like you'll get to pulverize me either. They'd probably separate us in an instant. Not like I like doing it either, Sunstreaker," Skyler argued. "It pretty much tests our disguises to the limit."

Sunstreaker huffed. "Enough talk, let's get this over and done with."

"Let's," Skyler nodded as he got out of the Autobot and opened his bag to get the right costume.

The warrior bot prayed they weren't going to be found out.

_Maybe praying to the Greek God of Liars and Thieves the humans called 'Hermes' was a good idea right now…_

__

* * *

 

William Lennox rolled his eyes and he was very sure the loudly growling engine of the Topkick beside him was a sign that Ironhide was starting to get angry.

An angry, trigger-happy mech was not the sort of thing any human would want to experience.

He slightly cooled his nerves down as the old Chinese man in front of him kept on yapping.

_Where was Prowl and Simmons when he needed them?_

"Is it not difficult to just make a call and get a taxi for an old man?" the old man protested in a thick Asian accent while he stomped the ground with a walking stick. "You army people have large black monster trucks like those, and even technology, and you can't just make a simple phone call? What's with that awful noise coming out of the truck! Are you trying to make me deaf?"

Will cringed as the situation got worse in a second. The other soldiers weren't helping as they were both staying far away as they could from an angry Ironhide in disguise. Bad luck for Will, the old man he was with now was hardly a person to negotiate or reason with. He was very sure that the old man was still going to give a good fight. Where on earth was he going to get a taxi in a place like this? He scratched his head.

"Sir, we'll give you a ride in one of our vehicles and get you to-"

There was a swift swipe with the walking stick and a yell.

"Ouch!" Will said nursing his foot where the old man whacked it.

"Young people these days! Can't even give some respect to the elderly," the old man grumbled. At first he wanted to complain but something caught his eye.

"Taxi!"

Will did a double take, there's a taxi in the middle of the operation? He thought the area was cleared!

The taxi driver opened the door as he helped the older man by opening the passenger door and guided the old man in.

"Hey!" Will complained. "This area's supposed to be cleared!"

The major looked at the taxi driver that was chewing bubble gum, wearing glasses, and had a thick beard. The driver looked at him with an odd expression, then said with a thick Yankee accent, "What's goin' on anyway?"

"There's an accident. The old industrial area's on fire. The whole area's been advised that civilians aren't allowed in. How did you get inside?" the Major was clearly curious.

The other chewed his gum and shrugged. "I was asleep, Army Man. Been in the taxi the whole night."

"And you didn't notice the sirens and smoke?" Will asked.

"I sleep like a corpse," the taxi driver admitted. "But customers give a good wake up call, you know."

Major Lennox raised an eyebrow at that.

"ARE YOU KEEPING ME HERE ALL DAY?"

The major cringed as he looked from the old man to the taxi driver, "He's all yours." It was better not to make the already angry weapons specialist tempted to shoot the old coot down.

"Customers are the kings, Army Man," the taxi driver said as he chewed on the bubble gum.

"Yeah, just go," Major indicated the exit of the blockade.

The taxi driver wasted no time in getting to the wheel and drove off.

The Topkick harrumphed, "Lousy old man thinking he's old and has to be 'respected'. It would have been easier if I could just shoot him to end his misery."

"Ironhide," Will sighed, telling the Autobot it wasn't proper.

But before Ironhide got to say anything in response, a soldier came to them, "Major, sir! We've found dead human bodies; apparently they were ripped apart by a large force."

Will did not like what he was hearing.

_Great, just what he needed, more paperwork to do._

"Ironhide, what do you make of it?"

The black monster truck snorted. "Just got a comm. from Optimus. Sideswipe battled with Laserbeak, one of Soundwave's minions. It's most likely his work."

He knew he was going in for a long day. Will hoped Simmons and Epps had better luck than he did.

* * *

After dropping off the old man, Skyler and Sunstreaker decided they needed to head out of town.

"Well done, Sunstreaker," Skyler commented. "Your first successful con of using the lookie-loo."

Sunstreaker growled, "I'm NOT proud of it!"

"Why not?"

"I just conned my own faction and they don't even REALIZE it?" the bot complained. "What's happening to those bots? Their circuits are beyond damaged!"

Skyler shrugged, "Good acting skills plus the old man was a good diversion for Ironhide, and it kinda made it a super lucky escape for us. Even your scent might be covered with all human waxing, plus with me I don't think he would expect you're a Decepticon. Decepticons don't even want humans inside of them."

"Tch, doesn't change the fact I'm in this crappy alt-mode for another three hours," Sunstreaker sighed, annoyed with his taxi form. "Why did I agree to this anyway? Pit! I can't believe I let the old geezer fleshling in ME! GAH!" The bot then muttered about how disgusted he was and how the old man kept on poking the walking stick on his interior incoherently.

The con man sighed in turn. "Well, mech, the other Autobots might be still hanging around in the area. You're meant to be missing to them, right? We might as well slowly get out of town and head to Kansas. We'll have to lay low for a while to dig for some Intel."

The bot was rather skeptic. "And how is that going to help us?"

"It's not a bad thing to listen in on the news going around the underground," Skyler explained. "We might get some dodgy or weird rumors that can lead to the Decepticons. You never know what information you can get, even Uncle Neil's finding out about NEST was also from asking around. We'll keep on heading towards the NEST base in Nevada, though."

"You know, human, by the time the military find out Steve's the hacker they will come after you," Sunstreaker reminded. "That metallic bird 'Con the femme mentioned is Laserbeak, one of Soundwave's minions. He knows your brother, which means he knows you. It's both Decepticons and the military after us."

"…I guess so."

The human was silent for most of the ride later on, as he was focused on his small book of contacts and only directed the Autobot on which the roads to take. Sunstreaker was well aware the human was trying to get out of his guilt trip so he could somehow make up for not getting to his brother sooner. Yet, the Autobot was highly surprised the one that took him was Sideswipe, out of all bots.

_Was Primus doing his puppetry on them?_

_Pit yeah._

Agreeing with the human did make sense that he was not known to be alive in the first place was safer for him and his twin. With his spark bond not acting the way it should be would make things difficult if he went back to base. It was true what Skyler had said, what if Ratchet couldn't help him with what Soundwave did to him? Perhaps there was more to what the human was saying than he could have ever thought.

"Skyler?"

"Yes, Sunstreaker?" the young man answered.

"What are you planning to do if we did somehow get Intel on the 'Cons?"

"We keep hunting down Decepticons while Soundwave is after me. If he's greedy enough for revenge he'll send in a few." Skyler said. "And if he's a true surveillance type of person, then we'll keep offlining whoever he sends after us. Sooner or later he'll have to check it out on his own."

"You plan to drag the fragger down to Earth," Sunstreaker concluded. "Not bad, human."

Skyler nodded at that. "Bingo. It's not that Megatron will keep on tolerating his failures. At some point, he'll be ordered to investigate."

"Plus you're avoiding the authorities as well," Sunny added.

The con man also nodded to that. "Yep, that too. Crazy isn't it?"

"But you're still hiding something from me," Sunstreaker said accusingly. "Spill it, human."

"… Well, I've been thinking…" Skyler trailed off.

"And?"

"Soundwave's hacking was rather coordinated when he was trying to get into NEST," the young man explained his thoughts. "It sucks up data, kinda like a vacuum or a sponge. I still don't understand a few things how he's able to resonate it with sound frequencies as well. I suppose that's where his name comes from-"

"Condensed version?" the bot went to the point.

Skyler shrugged. "I'm trying to figure how to reverse it."

"Are you going insane, Skyler?" Sunny asked agape.

The con man snorted, "There's a thin line between a genius and a mad man, mech. If there is a way to reverse the type of hacking Soundwave uses then there might be a way to vacuum his data instead. Maybe by doing so, we can get Intel on nearly everything on the Decepticons, and that includes what he did to you."

Sunstreaker was stunned in silence yet again. Yet he shook himself out of it, he should have expected that from the human since he wasn't the ordinary type.

"It's not going to be that easy, human. Even many Autobots failed in the past."

Skyler nodded to that. "I didn't say it would be. I might end up dying trying, but I believe in taking chances. It may take time, but that's how long cons work. You plan the unpredictable with the far-fetched, bet big, and you take the house. You with me?"

The bot laughed. "Do you think I've got a choice?"

"You do, you know," the human reminded.

"I wouldn't miss it," Sunstreaker truthfully said. "I think it's about time we got our own show on the road. Your brother's safer with Sides. If he's lucky, Prime might make my twin your brother's guardian."

"Guardian?" Skyler asked. "Like a bodyguard?"

"Something like it," the bot said. "I don't like how it works though since it's a part of our programming."

The young con man was highly curious. "How so? I mean- How does it work?"

"Hmm," the Autobot thought for a while. "It's like an attachment bond, like it works instinctively. When bots become a 'guardian' to someone else it's stuck inside them, like an instinct to always protect their charge. You saw in those photos beforehand how Sam Witwicky and Leo Spitz had 'Bee and those bot midgets as their guardians. Supposedly one bot can't stay away for long from their charge. So it's usually the Prime's orders."

"It's similar to how a twin bond works?"

"Yep."

Skyler sighed as everything that happened today was a LOT to take in. He made a mental note to maybe if he ever got to meet with their commander he'd request Sunstreaker to be an exception. He certainly didn't want the bot to be forced into something he wasn't comfortable with as he already had done enough. Heck, he was very sure that on this journey Sunstreaker would be forced to do things he unmistakably detested. It was the least he could do for the mech.

"Sunstreaker?"

"What?"

"We're heading for Topeka, Kansas," the con man decided. "There's a good number of family members there. We'll lay low from the 'Cons, Autobots, and the authorities for a while before we keep on moving west."

Sunstreaker then realized it. "You've been planning to get to Nevada all along. Haven't you, Skyler?"

The con man smiled, "I thought we'd head over to the military base there a bit later on. But… I've been thinking of giving Uncle Reuben a visit, if we're lucky we might bump into Uncle Rusty and Uncle Danny. Plus, that way we could dig up things that are happening in the government."

"Do you plan to join in their big con?"

"Depends how much info on the Decepticons we can get and if any are after us," the young man said with calculation. "I doubt it, but it may turn to a last resort thing. I'm pretty empty handed as it is now. Everything so far was exactly planned for Kansas City. My brother is with your twin, which went out of my plans. It sucks, but I'm back to the drawing boards about our way to Nevada."

The bot sighed with a sarcastic remark, "Add in more problems with humans and 'Cons alike that are after us, you're going to have to make more backup plans. We're slagged from all sides, no doubt about that."

"If there's a will, there's a way, mech," Skyler reminded. "Life is simple, but figuring it out is the hard part."

"Can't argue with that one, human," Sunstreaker commented.

Skyler went back to ticking back the contacts in the book he held in his hands. At times he would look out the window, wondering how his twin was actually doing. He may have failed to save his brother that day, but possibly the Gods or whatever deity that was there had different plans and there eventually be a time when they would meet. For now, letting his brother go to somewhere far from him yet all the safer was a good thing at least. Steve had probably suffered enough from being interrogated by the crime syndicate, Skyler doubted the military were going to try and easily break his twin when it came to a mental battle. Skyler believed Steve would somehow make it.

All Skyler could do now was to hope for the best that both him and Sunstreaker would reunite with their younger twins.

It would be sometime before the reunion.

But that was the prize worth the risks.

_Take care of yourself, Steve._

And somewhere in his heart, he hoped that Sideswipe watched over his twin.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 2.05: To Con an Autobot_

_Planet Earth, _   
_Enroute_   
_ to Topeka, Kansas, US._

 

_For the first time in my entire life, I never would have believed I was doing a con on an Autobot._

_Primus, I conned my OWN faction!_

_Pranks? Yes, it was a norm._

_A con? This was a first for me._

_Not to mention, I just played dumb in disguising myself as a 'normal' taxi and Ironhide just let me go like that._

_Have the Autobots gone BLIND or something?_

_I suppose the theory that Skyler _   
_posed_   
_ was correct. Considering I've been with humans too much I guess my scent is the same as the other cars around the whole town. Ugh, I can't believe I'm actually writing this, but… Maybe for the first time I'm actually thankful that I was reeking of human scent which _   
_turned out to be _   
_my lifesaver._

_Frag it._

_This journey is SO making my processors GLITCHED!_

_It's already an insane oddity that my circuits haven't fried yet._

_I probably wasn't going to be surprised by the end of it; I'm going to stay in the med bay for over a month with the Hatchet._

_UGH._

_The human Skyler was with no doubt disappointed in himself. From that afternoon _   
_until late at_   
_ night, as we headed over to the State of Kansas, he was mostly quiet, checking and re-checking things in his book of contacts. I was fairly certain he was blaming himself over the fact he couldn't get any faster to where his twin was when the _   
_other_   
_ needed him the most. He was pushing himself forward _   
_because_   
_ he wanted to make up_   
_ for his failure_   
_ somehow, whatever it took. Not that I blame him, I mean, who would have thought it was my twin Sideswipe who was the one who actually saved his twin?_

_I couldn't blame my brother either; he probably was following orders from Big Boss._

_While at that time I was ready to give up and try to re-join with the other Autobots, Skyler's resolution in keeping my presence on Earth a secret was what surprised me the most. He didn't blame Sideswipe for what he did in taking away his twin; on the contrary, the human was trying to protect both me and my brother from Soundwave. To say how it compared to the way he considered me as a brother went beyond of what I ever expected_   
_ from humans_   
_._

_Astonishing, EMBARRASSING, but TRUE… An organic was reminding me that there was always another way._

_The idea of giving up was just alien to him, even if I clearly saw that his pride _   
_had_   
_ recently been stamped on, flat to the ground._

_There are simply no words I could describe it with._

_But how did everything 'fit in' and just 'happened' in the right places?_

_Now I was certain, Primus somehow had plans for us. I'm not sure what they were, but it had to do with everything that has happened so far._

_So our journey continues. I was going to continue in fooling my own faction _   
_as well as_   
_ the 'Cons. Skyler was going to play hide and seek with the human authorities and the Cybertronians as a whole. It made sense in a way that it was better that we were separated from our twins for now. Sooner or later the 'Cons and the human authorities will know that Steve was the hacker who blocked the breach. It was a definite that Skyler was going to be hunted down as well._

_So we shared the fate of being the hunted for now… But to a con man like Skyler, it can only last for so long._

_The way he mentioned about luring Soundwave to Earth, I knew it was _   
_only _   
_a matter of time before the tables would turn._

_For the con man never hunts, as the prey usually comes to the con man voluntarily by greed._

_And if anything _   
_is_   
_ greedy, the Decepticons _   
_are_   
_._

_A Con Man with a warrior Autobot vs. the Decepticon Intel Officer_

_Who was going to win?_

_I was sure I was going to find out._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

  
**TBC…**

 

 


	11. An Unlikely Ally from a Casino, A Bothersome Addition to the Journey

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 11: An Unlikely Ally from a Casino, A Bothersome Addition to the Journey ~**

****

* * *

  
_Con man Log Entry 3.01:_

 

_When Doing a Favor, Weirdness Ensues._

_Topeka, Kansas, US._

_It's been three days since Kansas City._

_Somehow, I finally got over my guilt trip on my lateness that caused me to leave Kansas City without my twin. Well, matters weren't helping out much he was taken away by Sunstreaker's twin Sideswipe. Now that Laserbeak knows that Steve could break the code, I was expecting a 'Con would show up sooner or later. It was a matter of time._

_That of course depended on how discreet we stayed out of any curious eyes._

_So, what have we have been doing for the last three days?_

_Like any Con man would do. Travel around the city; get as much info as I can, and knowing who's who around town. The usual vital things that con men are meant to do to stay alive. And Sunstreaker? He was mostly more cautious for the last three days with his scanners on full alert. Not that I blame him though. With Laserbeak showing up, I was certain that it may have triggered him to be angry at the 'Con. He only briefly said that the 'rusty bird' was also responsible for his current state._

_Topeka_ _was the capital of Kansas. Nice city, good scenery, and for the con men around here, I can say there were a good couple of marks around to actually start off money collecting. I was actually surprised that Sunstreaker didn't actually comment that I was conning people around with Uncle Albert, Charles, Jonas, Lily, Ash, and Felix._

_They were the more of the experienced grifter group in long cons than Keith's but not as famous as Uncle Danny's. The whole state of Kansas was their collecting grounds and I was glad when I came for help, they let me in. As for who's who, Charles is their leader, Uncle Albert is the senior and mentor of the group, Ash's the fixer, with Lily, Felix, and Jonas juggle different jobs from time to time._

_In a good way for me as a junior con man, I was learning a lot from them._

_As Uncle Albert said to me, "Life is a compromise of what your ego wants to do, what experience tells you to do and what nerves let you do."_

_It was a good chance to actually test out everything I've learned all those years. To say I was thrilled to join in with the real thing made me excited._

_So, that particular morning, Charles, Jonas and Felix were doing a planned con on a greedy bar owner. They asked the favor for me to help out, and in turn they said Uncle Albert was willing to make trade-in for me for their group Intel. I was overjoyed to assist them, but… I couldn't help to try and shrug off the feeling something weird was going to come out of it._

_The last time I actually did a real favor ended up with me getting kidnapped by an Autobot from what seemed to be a simple paint job, and it continued with doing a cinematic car jump just to get my 'family' out of a police blockade from what seemed to be a simple chase through the streets. To say I wasn't troubled about something weird turning up later on was DEAD WRONG._

_Was I jinxed or rewarded in the oddest ways for the favors I've done?_

_I can't say._

_I'll just have to see what happens. First time's a coincidence, second time's lucky, and third time's a charm._

_Sunstreaker was actually curious on how on earth our con worked as it had an 'out of the ordinary' name. So, I kind of asked him to change to a different alt-form and park by the road to act as a cover for us and to see how it worked._

_Hopefully nothing weird comes out of this._

_What con were we doing do you ask?_

_It was one of the classic cons._

_The Pigeon Drop._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

_Con men and their terminology…_

_Why did humans use so many slang phrases in the first place?_

Sunstreaker was feeling pissed off the human left him out of what the so called 'Pigeon Drop' was all about. The Autobot didn't exactly like being left out of knowing something that others knew. However, after a good decent deal of time living with this certain organic by the name of Skyler, he managed to accept the fact that perhaps things were better left unsaid as he eventually would find out and the he was given the choice to comment on what he saw with freedom. Even when he was back with the Autobots there was time he had to refrain himself from commenting is own thoughts that many consider 'offensive' in silence. He was a soldier in the ranks and he pretty much left the diplomatic or communication stuff to the Prime or Prowl for that matter.

With very small clues to as what the whole meaning to the 'Pigeon Drop', the warrior mech forced himself to think out of the ordinary. The somewhat literal meaning of the pigeon drop was still unfamiliar to him, but Skyler did say that many normal people didn't know what it meant. Of course, when he searched for the words in his datatrax from what he received from Uncle Neil's data Sunstreaker was not happy when the human laughed at him which left him to be even more confused.

First the bot had taken to the word 'pigeon' which his direct result was an organic animal with feathers that could fly also known as _Columbidae_ or were commonly known as the rock pigeon or just 'pigeons'. So he tried a few translations such as dropping a dead pigeon on someone or did the drop have anything to do with 'droppings'? Sunstreaker shuddered on the thought of organic droppings, which made the human laugh at him for it. Surely the con men were better than that. Eventually in the end, Skyler only gave the usual 'you'll see' gesture which left the bot on where he was parking right now.

This made the bot very convinced that while living with his con man charge, he was going to get more of it in the future. However in another sense, he had a first person view how cons worked and even a picture to the nature of greedy humans.

Just as there were bad Cybertronians, humans didn't seem any different. While most humans were genuinely good, there were always the few that were very much like the Decepticons. The warrior wasn't interested on about the whole freedom for all sentient beings kind of thing like his commander. He was more inclined to see how these con men were normal civilians that took arms on people that many consider impossible to touch or defeat in any way.

The young con man was a very independent person when it came to his work. Yet he couldn't help but not leave Skyler unguarded.

It wasn't that Sunstreaker would let the human out of his sights now. The fact that Laserbeak knew who the human's twin was didn't help things. So even for the last three days whenever Skyler was on one of the cons, he'd be following the human around with different alt-forms not too far away. Knowing that he was snooping around and watching the con men, it made Sunstreaker think twice in making sure whether he had used a version of the alt-form rather randomly so he wasn't noticed by the other fleshlings that he was following them. Sunstreaker was grateful for the human to always remind him of wherever he went in the city to keep on scanning different types of cars that suited to his mass for disguises.

Now, back to the main event.

For the last three days was a learning experience for both Skyler and Sunstreaker. Skyler as he was honing his skill as a con man, and the bot was learning on how long con men worked. First and foremost, it wasn't all about the money. It was all about who they were conning and how successful they were at it.

Secondly, team work was highly essential when it came to make the cons worked. Sunstreaker for one had expected some sort of ranking system, but instead it was played more on roles. In some cases it would make the mark convinced that it was just a failed transaction to something so random that the mark had no idea he/she was hit from all sides. Even if Skyler didn't explain the con with the hilariously psychotic weird names, he was happier to explain how the team worked with their roles.

The first role came to the 'Fixer', which the bot already knew was a supplier for everything the team needed to do a con. Then comes in 'the Roper', he/she was the one that lured the mark into the con they were doing and making sure that the mark was under the team's control. Not too far away or behind the Roper was the 'Convincer', who would backup the Roper in making sure that the mark was certain to fall into the con they were doing. Usually while one Convincer is considered enough, there's always another spot for more. Last but not least, is the 'Inside Man' who is the key player that persuades the mark to give them their money.

Sunstreaker was convinced if these con men were willing to join the military, they would make elite infiltrators. He was about to think of something else when on cue, the fleshling by the name of Felix came sauntering in.

So, the scenario of the con men played out. Felix, as Sunstreaker noted from his attire was a security officer for safety deposits who by human terms was responsible for transporting money in cash. From the way he walked as he floated around without coordination obviously showed he was playing the role of a drunk man. Jonas, just beside a window that had a view from inside the back room of the bar was peering at Felix, yet at the very same moment he was getting the bar owner's attention (who happened to be in the room).

Scanning around to see how it was possible to get the mark in the very room, Sunstreaker found out in the room there was a telephone. Well, that explained how the bar owner was there right now as the bot briefly remembered Skyler bought a private cell phone number this morning. As far as the con went, Felix was the bait, and James played the Roper. The fact that this whole incident happened behind an alley way made it easier to pull the con on the mark.

Soon, Felix flopped to ground due to his hangover, dropped the suitcase in a large dust bin. Without realizing he had left the suitcase there, he staggered of into the alleyway. Skyler on cue came in from where Felix had went with a curious glance to see if anything in the street was going on. Simultaneously, Charles walked into the alleyway from Sunstreaker's end.

Once the mark came out of the back door, the con was on.

The Autobot warrior watched attentively as the group made their move in entrapping their prey. His guesses now continue to Jonas and Skyler acting as the convincers with Jonas acting out a more experienced opportunist street thug, and Skyler as a hesitant young man that wanted the money from the suitcase. The suitcase was now opened giving a appealing view of stacks of green dollar bills inside to the mark. Basically that left Charles being the inside man as while he acted he wanted the money as well, his heart rate was stable, and was steering the situation logically to his needs.

It was then Sunstreaker suddenly realized what the 'pigeon drop' was all about.

And it certainly DID NOT have anything to do with dropping dead birds or bird droppings.

After check from an English thesaurus from his database, he found a result that made the term 'pigeon drop' more sense. Apparently, pigeon was another word for 'sucker' or a person who was easily fooled or unguarded. So if it was rephrased it would be the 'sucker drop'. As the con progressed the bot soon understood how it worked. One drops a large sum of money in front of the mark and see to how he reacts. If he/she is greedy, the con men would convince the mark they could share the bounty on one condition. All who witnessed the event pay a decent amount of money in cash to keep their share, and the money would be kept with a lawyer for 6 weeks. If no one claims it by then, the money is split to everyone according to the deal.

Now Sunstreaker realized why con men hold their first rule of the con about 'you can't cheat on an honest man' so highly.

Simply because these type of cons don't and will never work on honest people.

The closest person Sunny thought of was Big Boss, Pit, imagining the Prime being conned was near the impossible.

Thanks to the planned scenario, the con went smoothly for Skyler's group. Sunstreaker was highly impressed at the control they had over the situation and the mark. From the beginning it was clear that the marks was not interested at first but the change in emotions to curiosity, to confirming the situation, and finally to the point where he couldn't hold his giddiness over the money because of greed made him eventually fall for the con. Of course, Sunstreaker knew by the time they got the money, the con men would never be heard from again. Even if they did exchange cell phone numbers, it was easy enough to throw the numbers away or sell it to a different person. In the end, all the con men parted ways to meet up at their apartment with their mark's money.

Skyler had deliberately stayed on the street in front of Sunstreaker, but after being given a miscall through his cell phone that the coast was clear and that his uncles weren't around he approached the bot's alt-form and got in.

"Enjoyed the show?" Skyler asked as he was clearly happy the con was successful.

"Hmm, you con men make it look like it was child's play," the Autobot commented. "That mark you conned on probably had greed that could rival a Decepticon." Sunstreaker then pointed out, "I don't see why you people have funny names for cons. So from all of this, Pigeon Drop means the Sucker Drop, no?"

"Yeah, it does," Skyler replied as he was driving. "We call them as 'Con Jargons' or slang for con artists, it's a way for us to know whether a person is a con man or not and a way to communicate without getting unwanted attention. Don't worry Sunstreaker, with you seeing us work nearly everyday, you'll know most of them in no time."

"Hmph, it's not like I got anything else to do either than to watch out for 'Cons," Sunstreaker snorted. He would have been bored ages ago of course. It wasn't like the fleshlings around town provided good entertainment or any useful information. "So with this done means they're letting you into their group Intel, right?"

The con man nodded, "Yup. So far we know that the clean-up party for the military left Kansas City yesterday. So, that it's a good time as any to do some research and follow some leads without having authorities around the area."

As they halted at the traffic lights, Sunstreaker asked, "You think we can get 'Con information from them?"

Skyler was silent at first but answered the bot truthfully, "I can't say, Sunstreaker. We might find just about anything. Who knows? We'll have to see what they've got."

_Hopefully nothing weird comes out of this favor._

__

* * *

 

A young man sat with a tired and bored expression in an interrogation room.

_I HATE government officials._

The 21 year old dark brown spiky haired hacker with cobalt eyes was still feeling slightly woozy after being knocked out for about nearly two days. To say Steve Knight was feeling better off not trapped inside a burning building with two fighting gigantic robots was not exactly true. So he had eventually woken up to find he was on a military base with not much of a clue how he got there. While the staff were actually kind to him, Steve was fairly certain at one point he would be questioned. Yet he did not at all be expected to be dragged away and questioned by what seemed to be a liaison that screamed he came from the 'not-so-good' part of the government side.

"Do you remember how to break the codes for the simulation?"

Steve deliberately shifted his eyes to the upper right naturally, "Only parts of it. I managed to luckily break it because I was under pressure."

_A lie._

He knew every bit of the code.

Yet for all con artists it was _always_ a necessity to lie. Plus it was the most basic knowledge to a con man on how to con a mark. All you needed to do was to know how and when to divert and manage your lies with control of body language to make whatever that came out of your mouth to be called 'the truth'. It came with the job, and not everybody had the knack to do it with grace and style. Especially, when it came to being questioned by government officials or authorities where there was a huge risk involved of the offense charges. He was highly aware that the man in front of him was testing if he was lying throughout the normal questions since the beginning such as name, age, date of birth, and so on so forth.

Although he was tired, Steve was calm as ever.

For what Steve concluded, this man was looking at his body language, especially his eyes what seemed to be for the last half an hour. It was simple math to the young man. When a person is right handed, to know whether they were lying always came to where their eyes shifted when they answered. When a person answers with their eyes shifting to the upper left was a lie (as they're visually constructing something), eyes shifting to the upper right meant you were remembering something, and always keep eye contact when you lie. For left handed people it was vice versa, and for the ambidextrous it was heaven to lie with the questioner would have difficulties in finding the truth although it was always a norm to stick to the right handed theory.

Since he was lying, all he had to do was to switch his body language around at the appropriate time and places.

Feeling thankful that Uncle Robert had drilled the main things to reply during questioning through his thick skull numerous times was enough to make Steve feel not threatened.

Not that the con man cared what the government official wanted. Steve knew that Director Theodore Galloway was very intent in getting his hands on him as he was the real hacker that managed to get into a government server and avoid of getting caught for a good 2 months or so. Being a con man had its advantages, especially spotting out very greedy people from a crowd. The young man was very convinced of smelling this guy from miles away and when it came to Galloway, it was like going into a room filled with thick choking gas. The greed was coming off of him in waves.

At times, even Steve was rather freaked out with the look in the other person's hungry eyes that were on him although he did manage to keep a straight tired face.

_And here he thought he'd seen a lot of greedy people from his prior training with his uncles and his twin._

_Man, this guy is a pig!_

"What do you make out of those codes?"

This time Steve frowned as his eyes went up to the right again, "Um… I can't remember. I was- kinda out of it after the goon beat me to a pulp."

_Another lie, he NEVER forgot something if it happened in front of him whether he saw or only heard it. But there were hints here and there that it was the truth._

Galloway shifted slightly but he forced a smile thinking he had somehow fooled the young man of his attentions, "Son, what hand do you write with?"

"Right," Steve said this time truthfully as he put up his right hand up in the process.

Seeing as he was not really getting any real answers he needed or wanted out from the hacker the liaison walked over to the hacker and said, "Are you very certain that you broke those codes by accident?"

This time Steve looked at Galloway in the eyes, "Look, people's lives were at stake there, okay? I had to do something and try somehow we all made it out alive, and it turned out to be trial and error." When Director Galloway shifted back Steve couldn't help but notice there was a neatly folded letter in his inner suit pocket. _Must be something important._ His con man mind was prodding his head that it was something he should have a go of nabbing it.

Of course there was still another thing that bothered the con man, especially how this liaison didn't seem to be all that concerned about showing off the sling on his left arm. What did this injury have to do with the liaison and him?

_Very peculiar._

"What is your opinion on the silver robot you saw with large blades?" Galloway said with an edgy voice to it.

_Say what?_

This of course made Steve raised an eyebrow at the statement. He wasn't exactly expecting that question coming. A memory flashed in his mind how Skyler who had a knack to spot out details had always reminded him that lying came with spotting out things that should not belong there, were indicators to be careful. With the sudden shift in the man's demeanor, Steve took Skyler's advice it was time to head into neutral territory. It's a known method that neutrality helps in making lies believable. Add in a bit of true confusion and it was even more difficult to spot out which was a lie or not. So this time his eyes looked straight forward to the liaison with frown.

The young man's response was plain confusion, "Can you rephrase that? I don't get what you're asking."

There was a sudden pause from the liaison. His eyes shifted to the upper left, which made the younger man aware he was plotting something. "How do you feel about the silver robot showing himself in front of you?"

_Ooh, he's asking for details_.

It was a clear indicator that the man was not too fond of whoever these robots were. Considering this questioning was taped there was a like-hood chance that he could use it to enforce the opposite party with charges based on what Steve said. _I'm going to have to walk lightly on this._ Steve made a mental note to make the enemy's friend his friend; but he would have to look into it later on. To important matters and to keep up with the neutrality facade, it was best to stick to general answers with only tiny bits of detail.

"He kind of scared the crap out of me at first, but he saved my life from the robot bird with red optics," Steve shrugged. On the inside he was aware that it was the robot that indeed separated him from his twin, but he wasn't going to mope about it. On the other hand he wouldn't be alive at this point if the robot didn't come at the right time. "I don't know who he is either, yet I do owe him my life."

To the trained eye, Galloway's face clearly showed disappointment before in a flash it was a stoic face again. Steve inwardly smirked as he successfully hit a nerve. The young man was very tempted to push more buttons on the liaison but stopped himself as perhaps getting support from the opposite party first was a better idea than making the liaison his enemy straight away. He had yet to know what all this robot business was all about and why were they were looking for the 'furta duo' so desperately.

Steve had suspicions on a kind of new technology, but could humans really build such things as robots with feelings? Even if the meeting with the silver robot was brief, Steve could recall the memory very accurately that he sensed the robot was worried for him when the battle started.

Too confused to what was really going on, he sighed and decided to bail out of the questioning with a bit of leverage. "Am I done?" Steve said as he put on a more tired face. "I do have an appointment with the doctor for my checkup, you know. And he did say I _needed_ more rest."

Director Galloway did a double-take as he looked to his watch. "You're dismissed for _now_," he said stiffly, clearly unhappy that his time was up.

_Crap, more questioning later._ But at least he was out of the hot seat for now.

As the liaison gave the cue to open the door, Steve tiredly walked to the door. There was a person guarding the door but he was looking the other way. Seeing a chance to do something just in-between the door and hidden from the view of security cameras, the young con man tilted in a dizzy state towards the liaison.

Panicking, Galloway caught the young man from falling with only a hand, "Are you alright? Tim, help me with him!"

Steve stood up again with the help of the guard, "Sorry, I haven't really been able to rest well."

"Take him to the medical wing," Galloway said seeing as this job was for someone else. "I'll see you sometime again when you're cleared fit and healthy for more questioning, Steve."

"This way kid," the guard said guiding the young man towards the medical wing.

Steve just nodded without anything to say, keeping a low profile for the time being. On the inside he was satisfied he got what he wanted. Neatly tucked in his brown jacket he had been wearing all this time was the paper he nicked from the liaison.

_Too bad the liaison didn't know what hit him._

__

* * *

 

_A while later at the apartment…_

Charles' con man group didn't have an Intel room like Uncle Neil did back in Memphis, however they had three laptops and were well informed of the area of Topeka and the Kansas State itself. The time Skyler got back, the apartment was empty with the exception of Uncle Albert who welcomed him at the front door. Charles, Jonas and Felix were said to be cashing in the cash they got this morning. As for Ash and Lily were on a recon job with another mark they were planning to target soon.

That left Skyler and Uncle Albert to catch up with both life and con artist Intel.

Even in his old age (68 years old), Uncle Albert from Skyler's view the last three days with him, didn't seem to have faltered in his con skills as they were ever sharp and controlled. His wife may have died years ago, but he was happy being any adoptive Uncle or even grandparent to many con artist families that were good terms with him. He was willing to share his con wisdom with the younger ones, which made him one of Skyler's favorite uncles. To receive praise from the elder con man was difficult, but with Skyler's recent work in Charles group con made it a good persuasion tool for the old man to agree and let Skyler into their group Intel.

With four laptops (including Skyler's own) and two cups of tea, they both looked into recent events, of targeted marks, who recently stole what, and news coming from institutions, universities, and even the black market. To Skyler's prediction, there wasn't really any odd Intel that would lead something that screamed Decepticon so far. Just as he was going to dismiss the idea of finding 'out-of-the-ordinary' Intel, his uncle clicked his fingers as he remembered something.

"Ah! Skyler, would you happen to know what grifter family gatherings are?"

The younger paused a moment as he tried to remember. "I heard from Uncle Danny they're large gatherings of big and infamous con families in a poker tournament as a trade Intel event between con artists," Skyler said from the top of his head.

"Correct!" the elder said brightly. "It happens that there's one in Topeka at the Black Clover Hotel &amp; Casino tonight. If you're not busy tonight, I wish for you to accompany me there."

Skyler blinked but he froze in place like a statue, "_Me?_ What about Charles and the others?"

"Well," the other said with a light tone, "Charles and the others are on a job tonight. I've also got a recommendation from Rusty you have a gift for poker. So, we all agreed that if you succeeded in helping pulling off a pigeon drop you'll be invited as a 'Caldwell'."

At this point Skyler couldn't even BELIEVE what he was hearing. Totally and utterly speechless, he never expected getting that sort of praise from Uncle Rusty either. These types of gatherings were for the famous and notorious con artists. He wasn't surprised if Uncle Danny and the crew or even Uncle Albert were invited as they were respected by many. Even his own Uncle and with his cousin had been to these sort of gatherings. It seemed too good to be true if he was invited tonight.

"Are you sure about this, Uncle Albert?" Skyler asked hesitant. "I'm only 21, and I haven't even joined in any large heists yet!"

Uncle Albert only smiled, "You still have talent, boy. The only way to prove it is through opportunity. I trust you can hold yourself well. But tell me, I heard you now can speak a few languages like your father, Taylor."

"A couple, but mostly Mandarin," Skyler shrugged. With people like Uncle Yen and Phing who often would go back to their native language in their con family groups it was a compulsory. Heck, his own dad was so fluent at many languages he at times severed as translator for Uncle Danny and Uncle Rusty to work with foreign con artists. He pretty much made sure his children spoke at least five. Skyler didn't like it at first when he was young he was forced to learn, but now he was thankful for it. "Why do you ask?"

"There's a special event hosted by the owner of the casino for poker players. His name is 'White Eagle', he's a native American, a influential casino mogul who's a former con man. In a good way for us, he's a donator for many heists around this state. To all the participants of the poker tournament, he's given an alphabetic letter to everyone and whoever guesses it correctly wins a 'special' prize that isn't part of the main winnings," Albert explained the details.

The younger man looked skeptic, "How does he expect the poker players to take their guess? A sequence through cards?"

Albert shook his head, "Simple. All seats are labeled with individual words. To guess, you simply sit on what you think the alphabetical letter means. Everyone thinks it's a chance of a 'happy-go-lucky jackpot."

Skyler chuckled at that, "Well, that sounds pretty fun for a free side prize. I'm in. May I see the alphabet letter?"

"Of course," Albert said as he took out a piece of paper from his pocket.

When the first time Skyler saw it, he was sure it wasn't any alphabetical letter he'd seen in the world's languages. However the style and distinct form somehow rang a bell in Skyler's mind he had seen it recently.

_Scratch that._

_He saw it yesterday!_

It was Cybertronian.

_WHAT THE HELL?_

Seeing his adopted nephew's reaction Albert asked, "Do you know this language?"

It was unwise to lie at the more experienced con artist, so Skyler switched to a diversion of 'condensed truth'. "…Yeah. I've seen it, but I got no ideas what it means. It's an ancient language I heard some institution was studying but I forgot its name."

Thankfully, the elder didn't start asking questions.

_Way to go Skyler._

_Well, blaming it on NEST and saying it was older than the Earth wasn't totally wrong or a lie._

"It's fine, Skyler. It would be nice to have a better chance at guessing for the special prize. Who knows you might guess correctly. But to other things! Let's get to the regulations for players."

Still looking at the letter warily in his hand, he had to admit in taking a crash course of the Cybertronian language was a good idea. Sunstreaker was hesitant at first at teaching the human, but after Skyler persuaded the bot he needed to know how the Cybertronian language worked with its encryption for codes. In the end, the Autobot agreed as long it was used against Soundwave, he was fine with it. Skyler wasn't happy that the previous recording of the hack they did on Soundwave didn't had any sufficient leads as to _why_ Soundwave backed off and couldn't get into NEST. He only knew it worked, and he was annoyed he still hadn't found or figured out HOW it worked in such a way to scare off the Decepticon Intel Officer.

He needed to speed things up if he wanted to make the recordings into something useful.

But first, he definitely needed to hunt down or know who let this sort of information out. It was too dangerous to be left alone and a danger to let it run wild in the con man world.

So that morning till noon he discussed with his uncle about the preparations with tuxedos, and how disguises were not allowed during the event. After all the explaining finished, Uncle Albert departed to make arrangements. The moment his Uncle was out of the house, Skyler face palmed his head with a large sigh.

_GREAT._

_Just what I need, more weirdness to keep me occupied._

_Third time's a charm it is._

_I might as well expect weird things coming for every favor I do._

He went down to the garage to discuss this finding with the mech.

* * *

Resting on the benches of the military mess hall, Steve rubbed his temples as he slowly tried to digest everything in.

He SERIOUSLY needed a time-out.

_What a way to start the morning._

_Interrogation with the liaison, getting a medical check-up, sudden meeting with alien robots… what next?_

Having a photographic memory had its perks and at times he wished that he couldn't recall some memories so vividly that it was bothering him to the part he felt overwhelmed. Not to mention the sheer size of the leader of the party that lead the group of what seemed to be huge 'Gundam'-like beings. Being amongst them was like being a tiny bug that was just as easily he could be stepped on. He finally met a couple of the robots that were in fact Autonomous Robotic Organisms or they called themselves the Autobots.

To a normal person, being out of the range of the huge 'mechs' was enough to calm their hearts. But to someone like Steve, he found it rather difficult in getting used to the feeling. It was harder for him to shrug off or forget the feeling and he needed more time to get used to it as he would remember the feeling amongst the bots without even trying.

Add in the information that he and his twin Skyler defended their military division called NEST from their opposing alien war faction in the hacker war managed to make Steve feel dizzy enough that he wished it was some sort of dream. While the hacker kept the secret that he was _RecordatioFurtaCorona2, _the news that these 'Decepticons' were responsible for the death of his parents and his younger sister made him think twice.

Revenge sounded like a good idea, but he couldn't let the part of being attached to the government was a good idea. Since now he was in the hands of the government, he wasn't sure how his twin Skyler was going to find him. Steve was sure that if Skyler was on the run, then it was going to be hard to catch him as he had plenty of family contacts to keep him safe.

The young man was also aware that his twin was regretting over him being taken by the government. On the day he woke up into the land of the conscious, there was a lingering feeling of immense regret that wasn't his. Skyler had always pushed himself pretty hard when it came to the safety or the happiness of his younger siblings. The loss of Scarlet was probably the worst for the elder twin, that during and even after the funeral Steve at times couldn't help but feel the sadness of his twin nearly all the time. This time it was no different, but as much as it came, it soon vanished as if his twin was accepting it, and was moving on to other things.

He didn't understand what was going on with his twin, yet Steve felt that Skyler wasn't going to give up so easily.

_What have we gotten ourselves into, Skyler?_

Steve let his head fall down on the table as he breathed out a long sigh.

Not too far away, but still in the military mess hall for humans, Sergeant Epps, Major Lennox, and a holoform of Jazz watched the young hacker with sympathetic faces.

"Man, I feel sorry for the kid," Epps said. "He gets kidnapped by criminals who want his skills, now his life depends on the protection of the Autobots because Laserbeak saw him."

Major Lennox sighed, "Plus we have a _certain liaison_ breathing down our necks since he's presumed to be able to crack Cybertronian encryption. He may be at the wrong place at the wrong time, but the search for the real hackers is still going on from the Pentagon."

Jazz looked at the hacker with interest, "He's very young, only a year older than Sam. I'll be surprised if the real hackers who defeated Soundwave would be as young as him."

"Kids these days are a lot smarter than you think," the Major reminded. "Some of them learn much faster than the previous generation. I heard that even some of the Intel agencies are starting recruitment just after high school graduations for the really talented ones."

Epps nodded to that, "Can't argue with that, man. But don't you think it's kind of ironic that the kid had an identical twin and he's separated from his elder brother just like Sideswipe? Sides didn't take it well about bringing the kid here."

"What did 'Swipe say about it?" Jazz quickly asked as he was worried for his friend.

"That during the interrogations the thugs that were trying to coax him threatened they go after the elder twin," Epps said. "Sides heard that the elder twin was looking for Steve, said that he was last heard being spotted in Jonesborough, Tennessee."

Lennox blinked, "You mean the twin was heading to Kansas City?"

"Yeah, but there hasn't been any reports of him missing or of him reporting to the police about Steve," the sergeant confirmed.

Jazz shook his head with sympathy, "That's pretty fragged up. Sides is blaming himself in letting this happen to another twin." While the first lieutenant of the Autobots did not mention to the major or the sergeant about how Sideswipe's bond had reacted during the mission, Jazz knew that Steve's separation was another added weight on the younger twin warrior bot.

"Anyway we could try and fix this?" Will asked.

The Autobot in holoform shook his head, "There's nothing that can stop the pain of loss with a spark bond. But… maybe if you help Steve out it may do some good on Sides."

"I leave you guys for a while and we've got new problem," a familiar voice came from behind them.

They all turned to find a familiar face that made them all smile.

"Well, if it isn't Sam! Came at the right time!" Jazz welcomed the boy.

The major and sergeant nodded as they knew of his arrival.

"So what's the situation? I was only told that we got a hacker on our hands," Sam said. "Did I miss anything?" He was tired from his trip, but he was an ambassador to the Autobots.

"You got the memo from Optimus about Sideswipe?" Epps asked.

Sam nodded, "Yeah."

"Then we're good to go," Epps said as he dragged Sam to the hacker.

Will looked Jazz, "Where's Bumblebee?"

Jazz was silent for a moment as he was looking over the comm.. He answered, "He's reporting to Optimus right now, the twins and Leo are on their way here. Said about patching things up first before they arrive."

The Major nodded as his attention was back to the human Prime, Epps, and the hacker.

Hearing footsteps towards his table, Steve sat up as looked upon his visitors.

He nodded in greeting, "Sergeant Epps." And then he looked at the brunette probably just a year younger than him.

The newcomer took out his hand, "I'm Sam-"

"Sam Witwicky, the boy that was believed to be scammed over by a hacker and made as world man-hunt scam," Steve stated as he shook Sam's hand. "But now I'm here I suppose the Decepticons were after you last year."

Sam's face slightly winced in embarassment at the revelation of last year's events, but nodded "There you go, you know me." Although he was genuinely surprised that the hacker in front of him said his name right.

Steve only shrugged, "What hacker doesn't? Especially after they had sent the CIA after you. So, what brings you here? Are you apart of this too?"

Epps this time was the one that did the main intros, "Sam's the official ambassador to the Autobots."

The hacker looked at Sam silently, as both of them took a seat at the table in front of him. He said, "Okay, I never saw that one coming-" he then breathed a heave. "But, you guys really have a knack to blow my brains at this point. So, let's cut to the chase and get this over with in one day. I've already been explained the hacker war that the furta duo hackers somehow managed to block a Decepticon Intel officer from your servers here at NEST. Since I'm here, I'm pretty inclined that you guys want something from me."

"Is it possible for you to crack the codes of the hack like how those furto duo did?" Sam asked. "It would mean a lot to the Autobots if you can somehow help them."

It was that question again, Steve looked at both of them warily, "Didn't your liaison told you he asked that question already? Or am I getting the feeling you're not exactly on the same side? He didn't want to sound rather mean, but Steve was going to make sure just how many sides there were around the place.

Epps' face of course had darken to a degree, "He's not really on our side, some parliament guys sent him in to keep an eye on us since the Autobots were not willing to share any tech to the government."

Steve could ask the reason why, but it was best to be silent for now. Maybe these intelligent beings saw just how greedy certain humans were when it came to making weapons. "Well, I don't like him either to tell you guys the truth. But- As you probably know I've only partially broken the codes to what the real hackers did, the hack the goons force me to do is only a tip of the iceberg."

"It's still better than nothing, Steve," Epps voiced in. "With your help we could protect and save more lives. The NEST severs are a lifeline for Intel and communications all over the world. We're sorry to drag you into this kid, but when the Decepticon Laserbeak was trying to get you, you've been marked as a threat to them. They'll most like hunt you down till you die."

The con man fidgeted his fingers of his fist, "Alright, if I did help you guys, how is it going to work?"

"Optimus and I are working on that," Sam said smiling. "He personally wanted you to make your own decision. If you wish to help, we'll see what we can do to keep your place as a civilian."

Again the table was silent, until Epps said, "Kid, if it's alright, your family's database didn't show up on the military files. Why is that?"

"My uncle's a government agent," Steve said truthfully. "His ID and family IDs are hidden to protect the whole family as he does some dangerous stuff. That's all I can tell you since I don't have clearance."

Epps and Sam were both surprised at the information but both nodded in acceptance.

"Does he know you've been missing for over a month?" Sam asked.

Steve shrugged, "Doubt it, last time I heard from him he was on a mission or something."

"And your parents kid? Aren't they worried about you missing for a long time?" Epps added.

The hacker looked down as he somewhat felt miserable every time a person would asked that question. "They're in no position to worry about me," he said with a bitter response.

"Home family problems?" Sam questioned softly.

Steve shook his head, "No. Both my parents and younger sister were killed what was thought to be a terrorist attack that was really an alien battle in Mission City three years ago."

Learning this, Sam regretted asking the last question. Even Epps wasn't sure how they were going to persuade the hacker to help them when this person was actually a victim for one of the families that died from one of their battles. The table was silent again as the situation ended up a stalemate.

Thinking it was better not to divulge back to the past, the con man chose to divert a few things for the moment. "So, back to macro. If I agree to help you guys, is it possible I can ask something in turn?"

"Depends on what you're asking kiddo," the sergeant replied.

"Would you happen to know where my twin brother Skyler is?" Steve asked with a serious tone. "Last time I heard, he was looking for me."

Sam looked at Sergeant Epps for an answer.

Epps shook his head, "Since you came here we haven't heard of any news related to him yet. All we know about him that he quit from his job in Louisiana and was seen by a few folks in Jonesborough traveling to Kansas City."

The news made the hacker feel grim that his twin was missing. He desperately wanted to meet Skyler right now or at least contact him that he was alright. Feeling rather foolish heading into a wildfire of doing recon without his twin that lead him into all this mess, Steve decided he needed to make amends. For now, it was probably better to work with these people and maybe somehow in the process or after the whole thing was over, he could find Skyler.

"Alright, I'll see what I can do to help. But, in turn can you try to find my twin or somehow contact him? I just want to make him sure that I'm OK. It's all I can ask," Steve said.

"We'll make arrangements," Sam said as he quickly set out a cell phone to text the Autobot commander and brother Prime things were better now. However, from Steve's body language, he knew the other was leaving something hanging, "Any other questions can we help you with?"

Steve's eyes shifted as he tried to remember, "I'm not sure about this, but is it possible to meet the mech that took me here?"

Epps of course was curious at the question, "Why would you want to request that?"

"He did save my life from a Decepticon. I owe him," Steve truthfully said as when he met some of the Autobots the one that saved him was missing. "I'd be stupid enough not to thank him somehow."

It was a rule for con men to always somehow to make it up to someone that helped you in turn.

Sam noted how Steve had mentioned the mech with 'he' and not 'it' as many people do when the first time people meet with the Autobots. "Sideswipe's at the med bay, I'll try to put together a meeting if you like."

The sergeant looked at the human Prime with 'are you sure' glance, which in turn Sam muttered 'Optimus' from his lips. Yes, Epps was aware that somehow the boy that was now a Prime had a connection to the Autobot leader, yet, he couldn't really see where this was going. From this however, there was an assumption that the Autobot commander was planning something.

"You sure it's alright? He isn't hurt from fighting the Decepticon when he rescued me, is he?"

Sam shook his head and chuckled, "No, he's probably one of the best warriors the Autobots have, tough as nails. He just has an 'illness' of being away too long from family."

Feeling that it was an interesting matter, Steve asked, "Who's he missing? So these… uh, Cybertronians have families?"

Seeing that this was an opportunity to persuade Steve to willingly the better side of the Autobots, Sam made no hesitation to explain that Cybertronians weren't so much different than humans in a way, although he stressed that the bots had a deep bond between them that was connected to their sparks. He briefly told that Sideswipe had been separated from his twin brother for a long time that surprised Steve immensely. Well, it wasn't everyday that someone would tell you that even aliens had twins as well. The fact that Sideswipe had been following and even resisting the crime syndicate during the time he was tied up at the abandoned industry area of the main base made Steve feel guiltier.

Sideswipe had seen his torture, which meant he knows that he took him knowing that Skyler was looking for him.

It made Steve think and shudder. How would he feel if he was forced to kidnap a twin when his own twin was missing? That must have felt horrible.

Not to mention being separated for hundreds of years, he'd only been separated from Skyler for a month and he was complaining.

Now, Steve was more than eager to do something for the mech.

"So, the offer I can meet with Sideswipe still stands?" Steve asked again.

Sam smiled at that, "You're up to it?"

"Sure," Steve agreed. "When can we meet up with him?"

"Optimus says in a few minutes, it's quite a distance to the Autobot Hanger from here. So if we go now, it's a leisure ride," Sam replied as he looked to the text message on his cell.

"Good, but give me minute. I need to get something," Steve said as he walked towards the canteen cashier.

Seeing the Major waved him to come over, the sergeant walked over to him.

Speaking in a low voice, Will asked Epps was going on, "Looks like he asked you guys for something. What did he ask?"

Uncomfortably Epps replied, "He said he wanted to meet Sideswipe."

"Huh?" Will gaped, but quickly straightened himself out. "And you're letting him?"

"Sam kind of explained Sideswipe's situation, censored version of it," the sergeant shrugged. "The hacker kid agrees he wants to help out."

"Let me get Ironhide and Ratchet with us for this meeting. I just hope Sam knows what he's doing," Will Lennox said.

"Let's just pray everything goes smoothly," Epps patted his war buddy on the back. "I really want Sides back on his wheels again, who knows the hacker kid could help out."

Meanwhile at the canteen cashier…

"Do you happen to have a nearly empty lighter?" Steve asked the canteen cashier. He then added, "And a spare ashtray if you got one."

* * *

"It's Cybertronian no doubt," Sunstreaker said uneasily.

"Sunstreaker?" Skyler asked quietly as he was curious to see the symbol in the picture bothered the bot greatly.

"It means All-Spark."

"Huh?" Skyler gasped bewildered. "Whoa! Wait a sec- Out of all the words or vocab in your language this lead I got from the casino means All-Spark?"

Sunstreaker grumbled, "That's one thing I want to know! The idea of some fleshling who owns a casino knows about this is disturbing!" He added, "It's not that all humans are meant to know about Cybertronians. Not to mention you said it yourself that the person who organized the event has tight circles that only correspond to con artists."

Skyler nodded at that, "Which means the government have no idea of such an existence. Those who got invites are from the big, if not infamous grifter families, which pretty much clears it up it isn't public knowledge."

"But why a poker tournament?" the bot said out loud.

The young man shrugged, "Because it's a game that's all about control of greed and tradition?" He then explained, "We do have rules of no back stabbing when it comes to the authorities, to never engage in a fight, keep to our own affairs, and to never target the same mark unless it's a joint con. So the poker game just servers as a media for healthy rivalry."

"That still doesn't explain whoever the Cybertronian is wants to do with a group of con men," Sunny said with a huff.

"Well, one way to find out Sunstreaker," Skyler said as he held the letter of the All-Spark, "We accept the invitation and investigate.

The Autobot was rather bitter, "I don't like this where this is going. If the other bot proves hostile there's no way of helping you without tearing the building down."

"Let's just hope it doesn't come to that," the con man cringed at the thought of it. There had to be some sort of explanation to what was happening. "Are there any other factions to your war either than the Autobots or the Decepticons?"

"None. But there are Neutrals. However, they're hard to find and there's very few of them or they may have died out. If they did come to Earth then there's a chance they would be here on Earth undetected by the warring factions. Yet they usually prefer to keep to themselves."

Skyler raised an eyebrow of the new info on Neutrals, but the fact this one was giving out an important letter of the 'All-Spark' just didn't quite fit in the facts. Even so it was still a likely chance. If it were an Autobot, the government would know and the con men wouldn't be anywhere near to that sort of gathering that had anything to do with the government. Plus the Decepticons would never want to associate themselves with the humans as equals.

The Autobot warrior looked at the young man with apprehension, "You still want to check this out, do you, human?"

The con man sighed, "It is the first and the best lead we got in three days, Sunstreaker. The fact I CAN'T avoid the invitation since Uncle Albert signed me up as a 'Caldwell'. I'll be royally screwed with my uncles and aunts if I don't go or deny the invitation."

Sunstreaker groaned as he rolled his optics at the so-called 'grifter family traditions'. He was aware that Skyler was staking his con man's family name in the event, and to one as young as Skyler it was considered a great deal of honor to be invited to these sorts of events. However, Sunstreaker wasn't too keen on letting the human facing a Cybertronian alone, not when the other bot could be an enemy instead. He wasn't going to risk losing the only human he trusted to fight with and his only guide to his twin Sideswipe. On the other hand, what the human did have a point that this was grudgingly the best lead they could get in three days, even if it had nothing to do with the 'Cons or his own faction.

"Alright, we go in," the bot said with a sigh.

"Good! Now we're talking! How about-"

"BUT," Sunny interjected quickly. "You WILL plan escape routes, and I WILL KNOW EVERY ONE OF THEM," he stressed.

There was a sigh from the human, "Fine, you win this time, mech." Skyler was now sure that the bot hadn't forgiven him the last time when they hunted down a 'Con he planned behind Sunstreaker's back. "Let's get to those plans right now as the event is tonight."

So while Skyler was doodling on the whiteboard of pointing out the exits of the casino and hotel, Sunstreaker was still feeling uncertain for tonight. He had no idea where this was going to lead, but there wasn't really much of a choice. It was better they knew whoever was behind it first than a bunch of Decepticons.

His mind soon drifted to Sideswipe on how he was doing. The warrior bot had a feeling after the whole chaos of pushing into their twin bond he was most likely being hit with a wrench from the grumpy Autobot CMO. Hopefully his twin was doing better than him. If Steve was the type of person Skyler said he was, then perhaps his twin was in for a surprise.

Besides, Sunstreaker was confident con men had tricks up their sleeves no matter where they go.

Even under the watchful eyes of the authorities.

* * *

Sideswipe was nervous.

He silently cursed himself why he was actually afraid on meeting a single scrawny human, but he couldn't really get over the fact he blamed himself for separating a twin from the other. The fact that both the weapons specialist and the CMO was here to see out the events so he didn't do anything rash didn't calm down the warrior bot at all.

And…_Why did they have to let the meeting in the Med Bay for all places? Couldn't they have chosen the main hanger instead?_

Yes, he did have problems that his spark needing to be looked at frequently now by the medic. However, why couldn't the humans could have arranged a better place than THIS?

Come to mention it, he wasn't even allowed to use his holoform.

_Glitching idiotic requests._

The younger warrior bot twin stood on his wheels as he tried to get used to the feeling of standing after Ratchet patched him up, although there was still traces of the dents the humans caused on him plus an addition from the medic's wrench. He did not care. It would probably need another day or two to heal again, and it didn't bother him the slightest. Looking around, he ignored the loud conversation that was going on between Ironhide and Major Will Lennox. Even if Will had meant to speak quietly it wasn't that the warrior bot couldn't hear them, there was briefly a conversation about the liaison losing his prosecution letter and searching for it. In a way, Sideswipe hoped it was lost for good or not found. The sentence of being taken off duty was not appealing to the warrior. Sides never really liked the 'aft hole, as the liaison came in with provocative words when he was at the point of his worst from missing his twin's spark. While his leader ended up apologizing, Sideswipe never forgave the human called Galloway.

He couldn't really think that if Sunstreaker was here, the man could have died instantly if his twin was in the same situation.

_Stupid law of not hurting 'certain' annoying humans._

Sideswipe wasn't interested of other humans; he just wanted to get rid of the liaison who kept on bugging the Autobots and NEST as a whole.

Hearing footsteps his attention was caught at the group of humans heading his way.

Steve walked in calmly as the mech that saved his life came into view. Although he did not have an ability to forget, seeing him now personally was different. Seeing that this was an important step that perhaps could determine which way Steve would connect with the Cybertronians and NEST, he revised everything he needed to do. He had to connect himself with the bot somehow and in some way.

Epps stood near Will, Ratchet, and Ironhide as Steve and Sam walked to where Sideswipe was standing.

Sam walked over to Sideswipe, "Sideswipe, this is Steve. He said he wanted to talk to you. Steve, meet Sideswipe."

As Steve nodded in respect, Sideswipe stood without any reaction.

Worried, Sam wanted to interfere, but as the hacker held his had up he stopped.

"If it's alright with you," Steve asked, "Can we have a moment?"

The human Prime was hesitant at first, but it then end he nodded, "Okay, if you need anything we'll be at the back."

As Sam left, there was an uncomfortable silence between the bot and the hacker.

Knowing that it was his cue, Steve started first, "I guess this is our first meeting in three days." The bot still stood there silently as he continued, "I want to thank you for saving my life. I'm indebted to you."

Still the bot did not reply, but his body language was nervous.

"What's wrong?" the hacker asked.

Sideswipe felt uneasy and went to the point, "Aren't you mad at me from separating you from your twin?"

Steve sighed, "I'll be lying if I said no- But- You saved my life at the right time. If you weren't there I'd be dead or worse at the mercy of the Decepticons." He bit his lip, "So, it's not a matter of just owing you my life, yet-"

"And yet what?" the warrior asked.

The hacker said it out with a smile, "I won't blame you about taking me away from Skyler. On the contrary, I want thank you for taking me because that way I still have a chance to reunite with Skyler."

In that instant, Sideswipe was surprised how that statement gave him a relief of letting a burden he'd been carrying for three days. He still frowned, "And what of your twin?

At that moment Steve's face looked pained. "I kind of felt he was regretting for me, when I woke up. Even so, Skyler somehow moved past those feelings, not that he doesn't care. It's more like he's trying harder. He… hasn't given up on me yet," Steve said with a rather vulnerable voice but with reverence, "So as long as he's looking for me, I'll believe in him."

Sideswipe pondered over the fact how Steve had said how he 'felt' his twin. Could human twins have bonds just like Cybertronian twins? He had briefly read a few articles while he was resting in the med bay after Ratchet patched him up. However, in the way Steve had said he believed in his twin painfully reminded Sides of himself. He had kept on believing that Sunstreaker would somehow show up one day, but there had been no sign of him.

"Even if there's hardly a chance he could get to you?" Sideswipe in a bitter tone. "Without knowing any information on him whatsoever?"

Taking in what the bot was feeling Steve said, "Missing your twin does eat your heart I suppose. You probably know it more than I do."

Sides glanced at the others who were at back behind the med bay area. They gave him uncomfortable glimpses, and or were faking coughs. He rolled his optics as he would have to deal with them later.

"…Still, Skyler would probably call me an idiot if I gave up."

The bot frowned, "Why would he do that?"

Steve replied, "Well, he'd probably go through worse things than I would. I'm pretty much here and waiting, it's not really fair on him if he suddenly show up after so long searching and found out I just gave up on him."

Of what the human said in that moment surprised Sideswipe. _Have I even thought how Sunny would feel if I gave up?_ He shifted in regret that he now felt somewhat selfish.

The hacker looked at the bot wondering if he managed to get in. He had a feeling it wasn't going to be easy. Then, he thought another alternative way. Perhaps it was better to pay back the bot somehow for saving his life. Hopefully this would work.

"Sideswipe?"

"What?"

"Since you saved my life, is there a way I could repay you?" Steve offered.

Sideswipe snorted, "It's not like you can bring my twin Sunstreaker here."

"That I can't do, but… I'll do what I can," the young man persisted. "I've agreed in helping what I can with the codes with your faction, but I'd want to do something at least for you personally."

Sides shook his head, "There isn't really anything you could do for me at the moment I'm afraid." However he caught the human smiling mischievously instead.

"Then let me help you in advance," Steve said confidently. "You know Galloway, right?"

That question sure took Sideswipe's attention immediately, "Yes." There was already venom towards the man in his answer but he didn't care.

"Let's just say- I don't really like him. And possibly from the way he was interrogating and questioning me a few hours ago, he doesn't like you," the hacker said. "He somehow pulled out a way so he could put you off duty today, right?"

"How do you know?" the bot asked suspiciously.

Smoothly from his pocket, Steve took out a letter which Galloway had been searching for, "He dropped this."

Sideswipe looked at the prosecution letter with disgust, but then his optics widen as the young man scrunched it into a ball, took out an ashtray from his other jacket pocket and with a lighter lit the paper aflame. The Autobot was confused, "Why? You could get in trouble for-"

"I'm already in trouble for just being a hacker," Steve interrupted. "I don't know how you or why you attacked him, but I don't think he's a very likable person either. So between you, me, and everyone who's watching this…" Steve gave a wave to the others as he signaled them a finger to his lips. "It's our secret, which means you'll be still on duty for a while longer."

This of course made the bot smile, "You're a troublemaker aren't you?"

"Comes with the job task of being a hacker." Steve shrugged. _And a con man, but he wasn't going to tell them unless it was absolutely necessary._

"How long will it take for the blasted human can make a new letter?" Sides asked feeling better that his other worry was now burning to ashes.

This time the hacker laughed openly, "Since it's got the president's signature, can't be gone through email so forth and has to be original… pretty much until the president finishes his tour visiting around Europe and Asia all together which is in three months, give or take. It may take even longer, since the old buzzard _lost_ it himself."

Unexpectedly Sideswipe managed to smile wider, "You're a really odd human covering for the mess I did."

"Nah, it's the mess that Galloway got you into," Steve denied. "It's the least I could do to pay you back somehow. Not that I haven't been in trouble before. I've gotten more than enough times in trouble with Skyler."

Interested, Sideswipe inquired, "Do human twins like to play pranks?"

"Yeah," Steve said, "I pretty much think it's universal in a way. How about Cybertronian twins?"

Over at the back of the med bay the group who watched over the two younger set of twins talking now casually were surprised and as well glad that their warrior bot was now in a better mood. The whole group now consisted of Ironhide who was watching amusedly at how this human was able to ease up Sides, Ratchet who was breathing a relief that his patient would be improving, Jazz and Bumblebee approving of the hacker, and finally Epps, Will and Sam who were talking amongst each other.

Sergeant Epps of course grinned widely, "You what, I have to say I really like the kid. He's got a lot of guts to burn that piece of paper like that with style." He looked to his two companions, "I vote he's part of our little 'hate-the-liaison' club. What do you guys say?"

"Decent kid," Will nodded even though he wasn't sure how the hacker got the paper in his hands. "We'll just leave Galloway to search a little _longer_ until he gives up. Since Galloway _lost _it, it means we don't have paper work to do for his mess. It seems you've got your cut work out for you, Sam." He then looked to the ambassador, "So why did Optimus suggested for Steve to meet Sideswipe anyway?"

Sam smiled at the major, "He said the only other person that would understand his pain was another separated twin. Optimus mentioned that some bonds are created because you share the same fate. Ironically, Steve and Sideswipe are in the same position."

"Well, that's good," Major Lennox huffed. "Although at times, some Autobot and human partners aren't really that much of a help."

This time Sam's face was confused, "And who are we talking about?"

"Oh God!" Epps laughed. "You don't mean the 'talking duo'? Hah! That is one epic partnership!"

Will squeezed the bridge of his nose, "Don't remind me!"

The human Prime gave a questionable gaze to the sergeant, "The talking duo?"

"Bluestreak and Fig! Can you believe that?" Epps exclaimed. "Man, if you want to get near those two you just _got_ to prepare a Spanish dictionary or some translation tool. They could go on for hours in Spanish!"

The Major scratched his head in frustration, "You know what Sam, I think I really need some help in convincing Optimus we need to persuade Bluestreak to keep talking in English and not Spanish for overall communications. If not, those two are going to drive me nuts!"

This caused Sam to laugh, "Alright, I suppose we can meet Optimus right now." He looked towards the two twins conversing with each other, "I think we should leave them for a while longer."

Sergeant Robert Epps agreed to that, "Yeah. Well, you two go without me. Sides is apart of my team. I'll watch over them. So go on, you two go and meet with Big Buddha."

"See ya later," Lennox left as he took the Autobot ambassador with him and respectfully Ironhide and Bumblebee leaving with their charges.

_On the other side of the med bay…_

"What's your twin like?" The hacker asked out of curiosity.

Sideswipe shuttered his optics at the blunt question yet replied anyway, "Arrogant at times, has a huge ego; he's skilled, ruthless when it comes to enemies, but he's willing to do anything when it comes to me, even stay in the med bay although he hates it.

"Funny," Steve laughed at the bot's description. "That sort of sounds like my twin, Skyler."

"Really?" Sideswipe asked curiously.

* * *

In Topeka, a sound of a grunt from a yellow Lamborghini car and a human 'hachoo!' was heard in the car basement of a hotel.

Skyler wiped his nose with a tissue but couldn't help think why the bot reacted the same time when he was sneezing. Yet everything was confirmed when the bot started talking.

"I have a feeling Sides is talking about me," he said slightly miffed at the reaction of his air vents.

His partner in crime shook his head, "Not only you. I think Steve is as well." Skyler then came up with a conclusion, "You don't think they got acquainted with each other do you, Sunstreaker?"

"It's possible since they're on the same base," the bot shrugged. "So, most likely."

_Oh, the irony._

The human sighed, "Let's just hope it's for the better."

The bot in turn only snorted without much care.

Skyler waved it off, as they had more important problems to worry about. He straightened his bow-tie on his tuxedo for the poker game. "It may take the whole night, Sunstreaker. You'll be alright waiting for that long?"

"As long as you now and again send signals that you're fine, I'll wait here," Sunstreaker replied. "If not, let's just expect half of the building will be torn down."

"Sunstreaker, you don't want to do that," Skyler reminded the bot about blowing their cover.

The bot uttered, "Get going then, human. Don't tempt me to tear it down right now."

Skyler opened the door and close it behind as he walked over to the lift entrance. "Geez, I'm going, I'm going. Grumpy mech," the human muttered under his breath.

"I heard that!" Sunstreaker said behind him.

* * *

The atmosphere of the room was amazing.

From people of the famous, large and infamous con families, it was even difficult for Skyler to hold himself from doing his own recon there. There were probably a few he actually knew in the crowd while the rest seemed alien to him. Yet, what probably made the room feel different from normal casinos was the fact the room emitted with an aura of mind games and trickery.

After Skyler met up with Uncle Albert in the lobby, he decided it was a wise decision to stick with his uncle during the event to avoid trouble. He still wanted to keep a low profile, even if his uncle ended up introducing him to other various con families who were his regular contacts that earn him a couple of stares that he was a 'Caldwell'. Not that the younger con man was surprised, but it was enough for Skyler to feel peer pressure around him. Still, this occasion was a good time as any to build up more links for his journey ahead.

At this sort of gathering, it was a MUST to build up social links that could determine future heists and cons.

Skyler definitely wasted no time getting to know as many people as he could as much time allowed him to before the poker tournament started. In the process, he scouted the poker tables that were going to be used in the tournament in hopes he could find the word 'All-Spark' or at least equivalent to it. Calmly, he looked around and found the area was off limits for now. Well, at least the owner was kind enough to put up a notice board of the positions of the tables and individual words according to each table. There were five poker tables which meant there were 40 players in total, each table hosting 8 players. With that many players most likely everyone was going for the slaughter of large bets, mental manipulation, and cut throat techniques.

It was clear that being merciful didn't exist in the tournament.

Not when these sorts of gatherings were rare and only lasted one night.

Looking at the notice board, Skyler scanned quickly through the list of words according to each corresponding seat. In time, he found the word 'Spark' on table four as the eighth player. His gaze then moved towards the table as he found out that players would eventually move towards the fourth table which happened to be situated in the middle of the room.

_That certainly was not a coincidence._

It brought many suspicions to the younger con man, and he still wasn't sure if there was a Cybertronian in the room as most of them were giant size. Even the femmes were roughly motorcycle equivalent in size. The best guess was probably the slot machines as they were the only things that was computerized (save for the card shufflers) out of all the other casino games in the room that served as entertainment for the non-competitors.

Just minutes after, the tournament was started with participants being requested to take their seats. Predictably, as Skyler sat down on the seat with the word 'Spark' on it, he saw most of the Chinese con artists avoiding his table. It wasn't surprising as they believed that the number four was bad luck as the sound of the number four in Mandarin was similar to the sound of the word 'death'. For the logical players, they tended to look for easy prey or people who they think they have a chance with. As for the more experienced players, they all went to table one to get into a decent fight.

Skyler breathed out to calm down as it was going to start soon and sent a signal through a comm. button that was inside his tux suit pocket the tournament was about to start. As for Uncle Albert, he was watching him from the bar across the room toasting to him for good luck.

Finally, the poker tournament of the Con Artists began.

To the younger con man it was an event that kept him on his toes. At first he made a couple of mistakes that cost him a lot of poker chips, but eventually he made a comeback. These players weren't the type of people Skyler faced before, save for Uncle Rusty and Uncle Danny. There was no room to slack off.

Round after round more players were eliminated until the last table in the middle of the room was left. Skyler was at the point where he wasn't wearing his bow-tie anymore feeling the temperature had risen from the game. He was now ranked 7th on the table that clearly were filled with seasoned con artists.

He was thankful that there was a 30 minute break before the final stage, so he took his time to signal the bot he was still fine (and NOT tear the building down), washed his face in the washroom, and joined up with his uncle for a drink. This time however, he actually got a great deal of attention on his status being 7th and he was only 21 years of age plus a 'Caldwell' was the talk of the bar. Skyler had to keep his modesty in check, even if inwardly he was like a kid high on sugar. Plus he was still on the look out for any Cybertronian activity.

For now there were still none.

_Maybe it'll show up when the prizes are announced._

Thirty minutes went by so quickly Skyler was back in his seat at the table with the rest of the players. This time though, all eight players were shocked to see the dealer was the casino owner himself.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, you're the best con artists of this poker tournament tonight. This is the finals, so give it your all and let's see the best con artist when it comes to poker! Let the trickery begin!"

To say the final round was a struggle was an understatement. It was war. The small blind and big blind rose up so quickly the the ranks began to jumble, that in one case the 2nd ranked player plummeted down to 8th because he got careless. Skyler was barely holding on to 5th-6th place. He was glad that he played the finals carefully as 3 players got kick out of the game simultaneously thanks to the 1st rank player. The the another 2 players, got busted by the 2nd rank.

Unlucky and out-skilled, Skyler in the end had to force himself back as he too got busted out of the game, reaching third place.

At first it was a disappointment, but with an unexpected applause and praise from the other con men around him that he was glad he gave the tournament his best shot. Especially when he came to Uncle Albert's side of the bar, he was tackled with hugs from all sides from Charles' crew in congratulations.

"I thought you guys couldn't make it," Skyler breathed out with laughter.

"Not after Alby said you got to the top 8 players," Lily laughed. She added, "That would go against the family code, family always supports family."

Charles on the other hand gave a fond thump on the back on the younger con man, "You did us proud, Skyler. I bet you anything if Danny and Rusty or even Robert hears this they'll be wanting you into a heist sooner than you think."

The younger one motioned, "Uncle Danny and Uncle Rusty, maybe. As for Uncle Robert it'll take some more time to convince him. It took Linus 3 major heists before he said it was OK."

Ash this time pipped in, "We'll be willing to vouch for you. Plus I heard a lil' rumor you helped out with Keith's group and jumped over a police blockade with that Lambo of yours."

The others gaped to the point where Jonas gagged on his drink.

"Say what?" Felix exclaimed. "So that Lambo stunt person in Springfield was you?"

Embarrassed and red in the face, Skyler only managed a small voice, "Err… Yeah."

_It wasn't like he was going to say the car was a sentient alien robot._

_Heck no._

Uncle Albert only chuckled in amusement, "Impressive and daring, Skyler. You have my support!" He then looked to the bar tender, "Wine for seven please!"

"Well, kid, thanks to you we got lots of people coming to us to spread our reach here in Kansas," Jonas added further as he wiped himself off from his previous drink with tissue. "Bet your father, Taylor, would be proud of you kid. If he was here he'd be bragging about you for weeks! Ah, the loud bloke, I really do miss him."

"Toast to Skyler, and our prayers he'll follow up into the big heists and be as notorious as his grifter family!" Charles said with his wine glass in the air.

"Cheers!" they all said together and clink their glasses together.

* * *

It was probably the best night that Skyler had ever experienced in his whole life. Well, who wouldn't be when you did your family proud, and got 3.5 million dollars as a poker tournament prize? After the harsh things he went through the days before, it seemed that the journey was all worthwhile. But out of all of this, he would always think back to the grumpy mech that was waiting for him back in the basement parking lot. If it weren't for Sunstreaker, he possibly wouldn't be on this wild journey in the first place. It was more of a real inspiration and motivation for the younger con man on helping the bot to find out what was wrong with his spark, kick Soundwave's ass, and reunite with their twins.

He waited patiently in a private casino room sitting on the poker table to get his winnings. As a matter a fact, he was called in here because he had won the 'special' prize.

_No surprise there._

His poker winnings were instantly sent through his recent bank accounts he opened, about five hundred thousand dollars he requested to be sent to Charles' con family member account. He owed them for getting the invitation and for sheltering him here in Topeka.

Back to the main problem.

Where was this Cybertronian? Or had it been a Cybertronian in the first place?

Skyler couldn't help but feel nervous as he waited for the casino owner.

"_**Click."**_

The young man blinked and looked around.

_What was that?_

"_**Click. Click. Click."**_

This time Skyler turn to the table to the source but there was nothing there.

"_**Click. Click."**_

Then he looked at the 'Shuffle Royal' automatic card shuffler.

_It moved._

Expecting something from it, Skyler slowly stood up and backed away.

With whirring small gears and clattering the card shuffler transformed into a small bot that was at height of a toddler with blue optics. The little bot looked at Skyler with interest and chirped.

"Hi!"

Skyler stared at it dumb folded. _Was this the Cybertronian that he and Sunstreaker were worried about all this time?_

_It sounded… like a kid._

The con man was rather confused as to how to reply to the little bot as he was still not sure about the bot considered as an ally. Unlike Sunstreaker who tended to be calm this one seemed to be fidgeting a lot, as it chirped, twitter, and still had his optics on him with curiosity sniffing the air as it started to walk towards him.

Feeling wary of the small bot, Skyler took a step back.

What he didn't expect, that the little bot made a mad dash to him, and tackled him to the ground.

"Oomph!"

"Smell same!" the little bot said as it twittered frantically as it found something important to him. "Smell same!"

Skyler gave a wave on his right leg but with no avail, the small mech was latched to his leg with a vice grip. He then frowned at the bots words.

_I smell the same?_

_I thought I was wearing cologne._

As he sat up, he gave another wave to get the little bot off but it didn't budge. Instead it was giggling frantically like his leg was something so familiar to it. Skyler eased down as the little bot did nothing to try and hurt him. Still, the younger con man was questioning on what on earth was going on.

"Skyler," the hotel owner came into the room with a smile on his face. "It seems you've met the little one."

"Mr. Wambleeska," Skyler nodded in respect but still had a plain expression of confusion. "Little one?" It then dawned on him that the casino owner knew of the little bot.

"White Eagle is fine," Wambleeska said gently as he took a seat on the floor with Skyler not really bothered at all. "Although it's expected someone who's Taylor's son would know a bit of many languages, including the Sioux. Although I did not expect you could decipher the letter correctly, and by the looks of my small companion, he seems to approve of you."

"Sorry, sir," the younger con man said bluntly as he looked to his right leg. "I still don't know what the heck is going on."

This time White Eagle looked at Skyler with amusement, "I'm not sure either, although perhaps if we traded stories we can see eye to eye."

Skyler wondered whether it was wise or not to tell about Sunstreaker, but he didn't want to come out empty handed either.

"Ah that look," White Eagle said as he smiled. "A look of the better and honest con man. Danny, Rusty, Robert, and Taylor have always had the most interesting group of con men. If it would be more comfortable for you, you can start asking questions and I shall proceed. We trade stories, and I promise you whatever we have talked tonight will be part of the code, this secret we bring to the grave."

Seeing that everything part of the code was intact Skyler nodded to the Native American casino owner.

He began his story in Mission City, being knocked by an unknown large force of the explosions. White Eagle explained how he had lost his wife in the event, and soon after the whole area was deserted he came upon the little bot hiding in a dumpster, shivering. At first he was intent on giving it to the clean up crew, but how the small bot had an affection for him, White Eagle realized the bot was sentient, not just an AI. It was living, but it was still a child. Ever since, he had taken the small bot under his wing and cared for the bot.

Yet White Eagle did have suspicions that the Mission City event had something to do with his kind, he searched through a few links but the Indian man was aware the links had somehow all lead to the government. Skyler then understood why his search had ended there, as too many people who sided with con men it wasn't an easy task in covering up a trail back to the con families, not when he was a casino mogul. So, he used an alternative way which was through the links of con men in hope that perhaps he would let this bot to live with his kind.

"I have only called on a tournament like this one before, but the little one did not approve of the person who guessed it. He knew that it was by chance."

The younger con man blinked again as he looked at the small bot, "Doesn't 'he' have a name?"

"No," the other shook his head. "It wouldn't be proper for me to name him. Names are very important. I think you are aware of our traditions."

"Yes," the con man understood. "But- Well- How come he said I smell the same?"

White Eagle noted that with curiosity instead of an answer, "I'm not sure, but he has many times proven to have a good sense of smell. Perhaps you carry a scent that he's very familiar with."

Skyler realized it.

_A Cybertronian scent. Of course!_

He had been driving with Sunstreaker and been with him all the time. _Now everything made sense!_

"Perhaps a trade of story?" White eagle inclined.

The con man nodded, "Is there away to get him off my leg?"

The older man chuckled, and from his pocket he took out a deck of cards. Instantly, the little bot's attention went to the cards.

"Ooh! Play? Play? Play?" The bot said with excitement.

"Just shuffle," White Eagle said gently as he give the bot the deck of cards.

It was very amusing to the con man to see the small bot so expertly shuffle the cards with its metallic fingers so happily and playfully he couldn't help himself smile.

"He's very fond of card games, including gambling ones." White Eagle said. "But to more pressing matters, I think I would like an explanation to how you have a similar scent to him."

Skyler shrugged uneasily, "Well, it might be hard to explain… but… I'm actually traveling with one of his kind. I found the letter you sent out as a poker tournament and it was translated as the All-Spark." He then looked to the elder man for a reaction.

"Then his kind exists?" the other asked.

"Yeah, a couple actually," Skyler said scratching his head.

"Is the one traveling with you here?"

"No, but he agreed to wait for me," the con man said as he gave another signal to the warrior bot he was still safe and sound from the button inside his suit pocket. "White Eagle- may I ask- what do you plan to do when you meet his kind?"

White Eagle only said, "Give him back for them to care for of course." However he noted that the boy in front of him frowned, indicating something was wrong. "Is there a problem?"

Skyler then briefly explained that there was a war in his kind that the race was separated into two factions, and that their war now continued here on Earth. The con man also explained they were robotic organisms from Cybertron, how the All-Spark had landed to Earth and the battle that happened in Mission City as well as the recent events of Egypt. He then voiced out his thoughts of feeling rather guilty if he took the small bot with him it was certain he was going to be exposed to the war.

Thinking on more for the little bot's care the Native American asked, "Is it possible for the little one to meet with your friend?"

Skyler was silent. Was Sunstreaker going to expect a bot that was probably a toddler or a kid? He definitely didn't know how the larger mech would react. But it was certainly worth a shot, and to go all this way to find about the bot was well worth it, even it posed no leads to the Decepticons.

"I think I can persuade him to come," Skyler said and added, "Would you happen to have a private parking lot? I need to get my car first. Preferably no surveillance in the area."

"I'll let you have permission and come to the private area of the hotel of my residence," White Eagle said with agreement. "I understand this meeting should be done with utmost secrecy."

"Alright, I'll see you at your place."

But just as about Skyler was about to leave, the little bot wailed and gripped his leg again, "Don't go! Don't go!"

White Eagle had to calm down the bot for a good 15 minutes before he was sure Skyler wasn't going to leave for good. Once the small one settled down, the con man jogged off to the elevators and made his way to Sunstreaker. On the other hand, Skyler was feeling guilty about what if they did leave the small guy behind. It wasn't like he was going on a leisure ride to get to the Autobots, Decepticons were most likely be behind their tracks once Steve was known to be the real hacker, and who knows what the human authorities would think of the kid bot. Even so, Skyler had a feeling that it was right to let the bot with the other Cybertronians as they knew what was best for him.

_Man, Sunstreaker is totally going to freak out when he hears this._

__

* * *

 

And freak out the warrior bot did.

He nearly drove over a human if Skyler had not forced to hit the brakes in time.

_Skyler's first heart attack of the month._

_Lovely._

He was glad enough that he wasn't even sued for it.

Skyler had to make sure the bot was not in panic mode and explain everything the best he could before Sunstreaker (with heavy reluctance) drove to the casino owner's private parking lot. Once they were parked in the middle of the area, Skyler got out. However from the way the bot was reacting, the young con man pretty much saw the bot was nervous.

"Sunstreaker? Are you alright?"

The bot grumbled, "Of course I'm not! It's been ages since there was a sparkling! All of them died when the Youth Sector was destroyed. The last sparkling was Bumblebee. Pit, how did it all come to this?"

"I'm pretty confused as you are, mech," Skyler voiced in, "but White Eagle was kind enough to take care of the small guy. I'm kind of against him coming since we're on a dangerous journey here, but I think the small guy would be better off with us on our way to the Autobots too."

Sunstreaker raised a question, "And what makes you thing he's better off with us?"

"Think about it, Sunstreaker," Skyler said. "He could have gotten to anyone's hand, and you probably know as I have how humans can be greedy. The little guy could have gotten into the hands of scientists and become a lab experiment. Plus, what White Eagle did in letting out a letter in Cybertronian was dangerous. What if the wrong people got their hands on it? We're lucky we actually found out about this before things got ugly."

Sunny couldn't agree with his partner more, especially about being treated as a lab experiment. He wouldn't want any small bot to go through such things.

"Does he have a designation?"

Skyler shook his head at the Lambo, "Nope. Native Americans have high respects when it comes to naming. I think White Eagle was waiting until he found a Cybertronian to name the small guy. He only called the little bot 'Little One."

"Well that's creative," Sunstreaker remarked sarcastically. "But- Are you sure you want a sparkling with us?"

The con man shrugged, "I don't know. We've gone this far in knowing him, and the little guy never let go of me until White Eagle requested nicely because I carried your scent."

The warrior bot was silent.

"You're freaking out are you, mech?"

Another rumble came from the yellow Lambo, "How can I NOT? It's been thousands of years since I've taken care of sparkling! Ugh. You and your luck, human! Next time, maybe you should deny a favor if it keeps coming to these sort of situations."

"Come on, Sunstreaker," Skyler rolled his eyes. "You enjoyed scaring the bejezus out of me when you jumped over the police blockade back in Springfield."

"And you nearly gave me a spark attack when I thought you were dead shot down by the 'Con," the bot shot back.

Skyler put his hands up in defeat, "Fine, fair enough. It's not my fault things just show up and turn weird when I help another person. I'll try and help, Sunstreaker, but that means I'm going to have a crash course on 'Taking care of Sparklings 101'."

"Not like I have a choice on that matter," Sunstreaker growled. "I'll be lucky enough to have my servos intact until the end of this crazier ever getting journey."

"Ease up, mech. First impressions are important, especially when it comes to kids," Skyler reminded.

Trying to get his mind to calm down the warrior bot asked, "What's his alt-form?"

"A casino sized automatic card shuffler. When he's in bi-pedal, his height reaches up to my thigh."

"Very small."

The con man shrugged, "He's just about three years old."

"Hmph."

When Sunstreaker was utterly silent, Skyler gazed back at the door as White Eagle was carrying the small bot in his alt-mode, a 'Shuffle Royal' automatic shuffler. Once he was placed down, the small bot wasted no time transforming and went to hugging Skyler's leg again making the human mildly surprised.

_I think I better get used to this._

The twitter and chirping of excitement was heard from the small bot again. At one point Skyler heard bits of Cybertronian and at times the little bot would switch to English and a couple of other languages randomly. Its optics shuttered with enthusiasm as he kept on looking at Skyler.

Meanwhile, behind Skyler just a few feet away, Sunstreaker was still trying to process how this Sparkling existed. He managed to scan the small bot without alerting his presence. At least the small bot was healthy and its hyper attitude was a sign that it was happy. However the warrior bot was reluctant and rather confused how he was going to approach the small bot. Sunstreaker noted the human who had taken care of the little bot was somewhat wise looking, and older.

"Where's your friend?" White Eagle asked looking around.

_Oh boy, here it comes._

Skyler sighed, "He's already here."

White Eagle's head shifted to the side in question.

"Sunstreaker, you think you can get the little one's attention?" Skyler asked.

Then there was a sound of booms and clicks which startled White Eagle. The small bot of course stopped fidgeting on Skyler's leg and its attention was on the Lamborghini car that Skyler had parked in behind him. In reply, he chirped to the other as if questioning who. When there was another respond from the car, the small bot's thrill burst and walked over to the other man, tugging him to come closer.

"White! Meet Sun! Meet Sun!"

White Eagle staring at the car felt rather cautious. Was the bot hiding inside the car? He gave a look to the con man, "Is he hiding?"

Skyler shook his head, "No, Sunstreaker is the _whole_ car."

On cue, Sunstreaker rolled over to them, "I don't hide, human."

There was a gasp from the older man at first then it was covered quickly as he regained his composure. "I'm White Eagle."

"Sunstreaker."

"I wish not to intrude," the man asked, "But, is it alright for me to see your real form?"

The warrior bot made no warning as gears whirred and parts shifted until he towered over both the humans and the small bot. The small bot of course was jumping up and down seeing his large companion in his real form. Skyler, already used to Sunstreaker's size only smiled as the casino owner slightly paled as the warrior bot's immense size and of course he was armed with two large double blades. Compared to the one he raised this one was by no doubt had reach maturity.

Sunstreaker without a doubt knew the human caretaker was intimidated by his size and his weapons. He snorted, "Well, aren't we going to discuss about the sparkling?"

"O-Of course," the casino owner stuttered.

The larger bot rolled his eyes. Maybe heeding to Skyler's advice of staying in alt-form was a better idea. Now it was harder to communicate.

Seeing it was a good time to interfere and break the ice, Skyler asked, "I know you both are weary of each other but… don't you think the little guy needs a name? I'm not really looking forward to only calling him small one or the little guy all the time."

His of course, sprang the sparkling exhilaration to another level, "Ooh! Name! Name! Awesome name!"

With his curiosity getting over his fear White Eagle was interested to know how these beings have their names. "How do Cybertronians earn their name?"

Skyler also looked at the bot in question as he never actually asked that question before.

"By their personality and function mostly," Sunstreaker said. "Although there are a few bots who have name because of what they can do or an ability that makes them distinctive."

Skyler then went through the names he knew of the Autobots out loud. From Ironhide for a weapons specialist, Ratchet a medic, Bumblebee a scout, to even the ones he remember Sunstreaker briefly mentioned such as Wheeljack as a Scientist and Mirage as a sniper. All in all, each of them were very fitting names. In exception to Mudflap and Skids really, but Skyler kept his mouth shut on those two as he had no idea.

Skyler then looked at the little bot, "Well, he doesn't seem to be the warrior type, so we'll be skipping anything that stands as 'tough'."

"The little one isn't related to any animal I can think of," the casino owner added.

Sunstreaker noted more on the small bot's characteristics, "We'll settle for personality then." The Autobot's gaze shifted to the hotel owner. "What's the little bot like?"

White Eagle then listed off the things he had experienced with the small bot. One, it seemed to have a very endless amount of energy, liked to play jokes that he could be impish at time, and had a love for playing card games. Gambling wasn't something alien to the small bot but the casino owner mentioned the small bot had a lucky streak when he was up to it. The older man also explained how the small bot liked puzzles and had an affinity to like all sorts or music to the point he viewed Michael Jackson as his idol. Skyler was not surprised as the alt-form it chose was a card shuffler, but he couldn't help but feel amused and stifle a chuckle about a small bot having Michael Jackson for an idol.

_Oh God, the world has gone nuts._

White Eagle suggested the name 'Shuffle' but Sunstreaker was against it as it sounded like a Decepticon.

The con man thought of 'lucky streak' but that was a little too cliché. He then thought of how some Autobots combined two words to make a name.

"How about Flipluck?" Skyler suggested.

The other two looked at him for an explanation.

"Well, he has a flippant nature, like cards, likes to gamble, is an expert in shuffling cards which is another way of flipping cards, and a lucky little guy," Skyler listed off.

Unexpectedly, the bot jumped and ended latching behind Skyler's shoulders in a hug, "Love it! Love it! Love it!" The young con man only laughed as he tried to balance himself so he wouldn't fall with extra weight on his back.

White Eagle nodded and smiled at this, "Fitting and he approves it."

Sunstreaker huffed, "At least it doesn't sound like a 'Con. I'm fine with it." He personally didn't really care what the small bot's name was ever going to be as long it sounded more like an Autobot name. Now that the human caretaker was calmer, the bot asked, "Do you know who his creators are?"

"His parents?" the casino owner rephrased which replied with a dull yes from the bot. "Hmm, he only mentions the All-Spark being his parent."

Skyler raised a brow at that and asked the Autobot, "Is that actually possible?"

"The All-Spark is the giver of all life on our planet. There are bots who are sparked from the All-Spark itself, as long there's a protoform," Sunstreaker said. The Autobot had suspicions on why the sparkling's form and metal was in fact composed of Cybertronian elements than elements on this planet. Yet, he kept it to himself. Perhaps he'll have to look into that later.

More confident now and thinking for the best he could do for the bot and his so-called new caretakers White Eagle looked at both of them. "So, I expect you two can take care of him?"

Sunstreaker and Skyler looked at each other.

"We're heading towards the other Autobots eventually," Skyler shrugged. "We probably need a fill in the stuff that he needs."

"Don't get ahead of yourself Skyler, I know what he needs," Sunstreaker cut it in, "The problem is how to get what he needs."

"I think I can be a little help for that," the casino owner volunteered.

Skyler raised the question, "What do you have in mind?"

* * *

_Two hours later…_

Back at the apartment, Skyler was at the garage just making sure that Flipluck was getting comfortable with them. After all, he did have to part with his previous caretaker and the fact both he and Sunstreaker were his official new caretakers, they had to teach the sparkling about a few rules and so forth. The con man was actually surprised when White Eagle offered him his best and closest contacts when it came to the sparkling's well being. At this rate, he was pretty sure that the government probably couldn't get their hands on him so easily without a fight.

Then there was a new thing Skyler had learned that night about.

Energon.

All this time, he was not aware that Sunstreaker needed energon to survive which made him guilty for the mech.

Sunstreaker waved it off was he didn't like the gasoline that humans had in particular, but since there was a sparkling now, he'd have to convert it in energon to make sure the sparkling was healthy. Even so, he was surprised that the smaller mech could actually do it for himself when he was given a large can of oil. The warrior bot wasn't sure how the sparkling knew but he figured it had something to do with the All-Spark leaving or giving him more knowledge than a normal sparkling for the age of only three measly years. Assuming it had something to do with the hazardous conditions of the human world, maybe it wasn't so odd that this sparkling had his survival instincts being pushed to the max.

The warrior bot was now not exactly happy being degraded to an equivalent of a sparkling sitter which the human out right laughed at him for it. The human was lucky enough to take care of shelter preparations and so forth which the bot could not do. Sunstreaker was actually surprised how Skyler had made his current con family believe he won an official casino card shuffler (which was in a way the truth) and managed to get them all stay upstairs counting the money Skyler gave them to split amongst them.

Now with a sparkling on their journey, the bot grudgingly didn't want to know what else lied ahead.

Suddenly, he felt a tapping of metal fingers on his alt-form.

"Can I sleep inside?" the small bot chirped pointing into the bot's interior.

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"_Pretty please_?"

"NO."

Flipluck then sulked and his optics glowed with a light blue hue and shuttered very gently as he pouted at the taller and large mech.

Sunstreaker growled.

The small bot whimpered.

Still, the larger bot gave no answer.

Flipluck started to cry...

"Scrap!" Sunny muttered. "Fine! You can sleep in my interior." He grudgingly opened the door.

"Yeah!" Flipluck jumped jittery as his facade disappeared in an instant.

The con man of course gaped. _Did I just see a Cybertronian version of the 'puppy-eyes' pout?_

_Not to mention the mech had actually felt for it!_

Skyler had to actually close his mouth with both of his hands to stop the laughter that was threatening to pour out, but he miserably failed.

"NOT a WORD!" Sunstreaker warned the human about not to tell any of this to the other bots. "Stop laughing at me, Skyler!"

"Sorry, Sunstreaker, I couldn't help it," Skyler laughed out crying into tears and holding onto his stomach. He then breathed out catching his breath. He put his hands in front of him as a sign of peace and surrender although he was still smiling a Cheshire Cat grin, "My lips are sealed, mech."

Sunstreaker turned back to Flipluck who was also laughing at him, "It's ONLY for _tonight_."

"Aww," the sparkling moaned. He looked to Skyler for a defense but the human apologized with an 'I can't do anything for you' look.

The little bot then scrambled into Sunstreaker's interior as he held to the car door frame.

"Watch the paint job!"

Skyler couldn't help but chuckle and shake his head in amusement.

_A warrior bot, a con man, and… a sparkling?_

_Man, I think this journey's insanity level went to its peak._

He then suddenly remembered a saying that goes, 'Life is a story written by God's finger.'

_Too bad when it comes to my life, God got too creative._

Yet Skyler was certain that it was an unforgettable one.

Leaving Sunstreaker becoming the victim of being a 'sparkling sitter', Skyler headed up upstairs to get some long earned sleep.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 3.01:_

_Annoying Con Artist Traditions, I am NOT a Sparkling Sitter!_

_Topeka, Kansas, US._

_Con men seriously have too much creativity for their own good._

_Just when people or anyone think it's impossible to pull of something, they make things work wonders. Weird jargon, manipulating other's people greed, and even to the point of having some insane traditions of poker tournaments. In many cases in the past, I probably couldn't care less of those small things that happened around me. Truthfully, I was dead bored in waiting for Skyler to get Intel and hoping for some sort of sign that would lead to Soundwave._

_After what happened three days ago, I couldn't help but feel that Sideswipe would end up as a target whether it was all about the spark tamperment or not. I soon realized with the fact that it was Sides that took Steve, he later be responsible for the human's twin and that meant Soundwave will eventually target him. To say I was worried was true enough, and I was hoping for any sort of sign of a Cybertronian to at least to pop up in Skyler's search for Intel._

_What I didn't expect was to have my hopes backfire on me._

_Of what seemed to be a large event of a con artist poker tournament gathering, the casino owner sends out invites with the letter of the All-Spark. I was wary enough to actually have thoughts I was going to face a Neutral or a hiding Decepticon._

_Heh, all that worrying wasn't even worth it!_

_Like everything happening wasn't enough…_

_Pop comes out a sparkling!_

_ARGH!_

_THAT'S IT!_

_This journey is TOO INSANE!_

_As much as I really just want to break my circuits and throw them in a heap of junk, I had to keep up my dignity._

_At least what was left of it._

_I was traveling with a human who now I considered a brother, I change my alt-form time to time with a different color, and now I've been degraded... to a sparkling sitter._

_Great fun, eh?_

_FUN MY 'AFT!_

_Scrap, what is Skyler thinking of anyway? The Pit I know what's going on inside his puny little head._

_Nevertheless, it was really awkward how I couldn't get mad at him for it, even when he laughed at me over and over again today. I guess I was happy to see him better off than he had been the last three days after he had been separated from his twin. He was mostly gloomy at times, despite the successful cons he did; it wasn't enough to get rid of his forced smile he was acting out in front of the others. I suppose he really needed a break from it all, some fun to wash out the sorrow, even if it lasted a night._

_Flipluck (as Skyler named him) was a very smart little bot for a sparkling, I had ideas that perhaps some of the All-Spark's knowledge was inside him yet there were still a lot of things I don't know about him. He pretty much had a flippant character just like Skyler said, but to tell you the truth, I still can't imagine just how he'll turn up to be as a mech. Pit, the ones that were taking care of him was a warrior bot and a con man! Not your so 'good education' people for youngsters. Ugh, I hope when I get back to the Autobots Ironhide won't shoot me to bits about that part._

_So that night while the sparkling was finally asleep in my interior, I checked back in my datatrax for the lessons I've learned while 'Bee was a sparkling. Especially the parts of dealing temper tantrums when it came to difficult sparklings._

_Pit, I better work on my immunity for the 'sparkly glowing optics tactic'. I definitely don't want a sparkling with leverage on me._

_The fact that Skyler was in this one didn't help at all._

_A sparkling learning how to blackmail?_

_That was WAY too dangerous._

_That's NOT going to happen._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

 

**TBC…**

 


	12. Busted by the Visitor, A Surprising Guest

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 12: Busted by the Visitor, A Surprising Guest ~**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 3.02: Adapting to a Nomadic Life_

_City of Oakley_   
_, Kansas, US_   
_._

_Since I was a kid eagerly dreaming of becoming a con man, I had anticipated a nomadic life once the big heists start to kick in._

_Apparently, I'm not in any big heists and yet, here I am._

_In a way, it was like a road trip. Only there was something different about this so-called road trip I was on, with me was an Autobot warrior, Sunstreaker, and a sparkling who I named Flipluck._

_Yeah, you could say aliens are my road buddies._

_Moving slowly westwards towards Nevada, it was no doubt the slowest travel time compared to the time we went at a blinding speed from the trip before. We were nearing the Colorado State border soon, and there were still no signs of any Decepticon activity. Three days after we gained an additional member to our journey, Sunstreaker wasn't really nagging as much as he usually did as he had a new distraction to deal with._

_Yes, the sparkling in our midst was very good at creating diversions._

_Or should I call him the little expert?_

_To say that Flipluck was a normal child with energy would be an understatement. It was like facing a hyperactive kid on sugar AND steroids. NO, I'm NOT kidding, and if there was anything you needed in facing Flipluck, it included a whole LOT of patience, stamina, and TONS of ideas on how to get him distracted._

_Just say Sunstreaker and I learned it the hard way - I won't go into the details, but by the end of the day we both agreed about what time was our turn to 'distract' the sparkling._

_For the sake of the mech's sanity, I deliberately bought two PSP handheld consoles with all the available card games created to date at a game store to make sure the small sparkling was occupied during the time we traveled on the highway, which for Flipluck seemed like an eternity. Sunstreaker of course was thankful for it as he had more important things like focusing on driving on the road. Oh, did I mention that Kansas (towards the countryside) is known for its hazardous weather? At one point it was raining hard, afterwards it was so windy the sand danced on the roads, next it was so hot that I was sweating, and then there was a point it hailed snow for a few minutes._

_Flipluck and I were safe inside._

_The mech, however, was not so lucky._

_It drove Sunstreaker crazy when his exterior ended up in a mess._

_And he, like usual, demanded a wash._

_So, I had to think of a pit stop._

_Since we were on the No.70 Interstate road, I decided the best place to get our bearings and rest over from traveling was to stop at Oakley. Unlike the hustle and bustle you would expect from cities like Topeka or Kansas City, Oakley was more a close-knit community-based city where most who live there are families, the suburban type towards the country community sort of thing. No, there aren't any active con men around here (it wasn't really a good place for hunting marks), only a few retired ones - you could pretty much count them with your fingers. So I had to earn my keep to blend in. Even if I still had a lot left to spend on my last winnings from the poker tournament, perhaps lying low was for the best._

_Best thing was the majority of the folks in Oakley were truck drivers, mechanics, workers who deal with automotive customizations and electronics._

_Getting a job for me was a piece of cake and as a bonus, there was a small house with an empty large old workshop we were now staying in._

_As for the carwash, well, you could say there was another Soap War involved. Sadly I lost this round and ended up changing my clothes five times because I got wet over and over. Sunstreaker was smarter in having Flipluck on his side this time as he was resolute in getting revenge on me for the God knows how many times I laughed at him in the previous days. I suppose I did deserve it and it was a lost cause to complain about it._

_With all of the quietness around Oakley, I thought I could least breathe a little._

_What I didn't expect was a visitor that I would get into trouble with._

_Just who was that visitor?_

_You'll see._

_~ Sky_

__

* * *

 

Blue mini optics shuttered and lit as a small bot resumed from recharge.

Waking up and pushing the blanket off the couch, Flipluck turned on his scanners to find that his human caretaker was absent from the house. Shrugging it off – it being the norm - the small sparkling glanced at a clock on the wall and discovered it was 8 am. It was a habit for Skyler to be an 'early bird' as the humans put it. Flipluck liked waking up early, too, for him it meant more time to have fun before the human left for work.

With spirited intent and a new bursting supply of energy for the day, the sparkling scuttled away in joy towards the garage, hoping to find Skyler and his other, larger, caretaker, Sunstreaker.

Entering the garage as quiet as a cat on its paws, Flipluck peered from behind a small storage tool cupboard to find Skyler using his laptop to work on what his caretaker called cracking codes. The human said it had something important to do with some person named Soundwave, and while the sparkling didn't understand how it was important, he did know that Soundwave was a bad bot that both his caretakers were trying to avoid for now. Sunstreaker, on the other hand, was there in his alt-form as usual, probably overseeing what Skyler was doing while typing away on his laptop.

But that wasn't important right now for a sparkling like Flipluck.

Feeling mischievous and with an idea in mind, the small bot sneaked and tiptoed his way towards Skyler.

Every step was done in calculation and silence.

_Closer and closer, just a few more steps and…_

"Morning, Flipluck," the con man chuckled at the smaller bot without looking back.

"Aww!" the sparkling moaned and sulked, clearly disappointed at the fact that his surprise was found out. He then pouted, "How? How? How?"

Laughter came from Sunstreaker, who was in a red Toyota Camry alt-mode. "Better luck next time, runt. Try sneaking up to Skyler when he doesn't have a hand mirror with him."

"Sun no fun!" the small bot moped, pointing at the larger bot while he stomped his small metallic foot on the floor.

"Hmph, don't blame it on me if you can't surprise the human," Sunstreaker replied.

"Maybe next time, Flipluck," Skyler smiled, patting the sparkling on the head and showing him a hand mirror in his hand. "How about breakfast?" And with that, he gave the can of oil sitting beside him to the small bot.

Easily distracted by something better than his failed attempt to shock his caretaker, the hungry Flipluck squealed with delight. "Yes, please! Yes, please!" Without further delay, he quickly took the can and started to convert it into energon before he took a sip.

Sunstreaker watched as the smaller bot did so, then commented, "I still have no idea how he knows how to do that. Even younglings weren't even able to do that sort of thing back on Cybertron."

"Maybe its best not to question that," the human shrugged and looked at the larger bot. "You're getting better at ignoring his pouts."

A grumble came from Sunny. "What are you implying?" He was not happy when he saw the human stifle a laugh. He protested instantly, "Hey! It's been over a couple thousand years since I've been with a sparkling!"

"Doesn't change the fact you fell for Flipluck's charm a couple of times," Skyler hinted.

"Shut up, human," Sunstreaker muttered. "How did you _not_ fall for the little runt like I did?"

Skyler chuckled. "I do have the advantage as I used to have a younger sister."

"So that adds to your immunity?" Sunstreaker replied, not impressed that he was somehow beaten by a human on this matter. Apparently the bot knew that younger twins _did not_ count.

"Trust me, mech," the con man said, "Girls are far more dangerous with the 'pout technique' than boys. Not to mention they're more persistent. Scarlet used to sway me more times than I can count to get what she wanted."

_Scrap, defeated by the human again._ _Perhaps that previous 'Soap War' wasn't enough._

The warrior bot snorted and decided to shift things away from the last topic. "Know what's your next course of action?"

Skyler then walked over to the road map that was pinned up by magnets on a whiteboard. "We're heading to Denver, which is the capital of Colorado State. Keith's whole crew is there, and we're bound to be safer than we are now. Oakley is a good place to retire, but not really a good place to hide from authorities. The locals have a thing for gossip, so we might as well leave soon."

"Have you contacted them?"

"Yeah. They're all doing well. I avoided contacting Rachel though; I prefer to explain to her personally about Steve," Skyler shifted uncomfortably, "Underground and street Intel is pretty bad in a place like this, but there's been a increase in hacker forum activity. I suppose we need to keep an eye out in case Soundwave is up to something."

This was new information for the mech. "Wait, you mean this sort of activity has happened before?"

The youth shrugged, "It's how Steve and I picked up the initial odd lead to the NEST server. However it doesn't seem to be developing at a fast rate like it did before." Skyler rubbed his chin. "Do you think Soundwave is trying to lure us in?"

"Doubtful," Sunstreaker scoffed. "It's not Soundwave's type of thing to lure his opponents in, even if he is the surveillance type of bot. He prefers to take things into his own hands without touching his prey. If anything, he's sent someone else to do it."

Agreeing with Sunstreaker, Skyler nodded, "True. That would mean I have less time to prepare for it…or, I'm going to have to let the next hack slide. A single sample isn't enough to find out what made Soundwave back off from the hacker war Steve and I got ourselves into." He sighed, "What do you think, Sunstreaker?"

"Let the Autobots handle this."

"What?" The con man said with surprise. Then he stopped himself, realizing then that the mech was on to something. "Tell me something that I don't know, Sunstreaker."

A snort came from the Toyota Camry, "Don't you think it was weird how we managed to bump into Ironhide so quickly when we missed saving your twin, just minutes after you hacked that building?"

The notion froze Skyler in an instant.

_There was an Autobot who detected the hacking._

_Rest assured that bot had to be real DAMN GOOD at it._

Seeing the human in a frigid silence, Sunstreaker added, "It's definitely not Wheeljack or Hound's type of work to detect and break down Soundwave's complicated encoding or yours. Also, so far none of the Autobots we've seen from your uncle's video have the sort of skills in hacking decoding so quickly." A grunt. "Safe to say, we have a newcomer or a group of Autobots who may have recently come on Earth just before I did."

"And who might they be?" Skyler asked in a serious tone. "I-I mean the bot who managed to detect what we were doing?"

"Prowl, the Autobot's Strategist."

The human was lost for words before he said, "…No wonder you freaked out."

Sunstreaker sardonically sighed, "We're finally on the same page, human." However he quickly changed his demeanor, "Well, that really doesn't matter now. Hmph. Prowl's weakness is illogical things, and since your ideas are so far-fetched, they should make his circuits blow in an instant. For now, we keep to your plans." He then noted with a stern tone, "A piece of advice, Skyler. The next time you hack, give no room for giving out any clues that lead towards you unless you intend to."

"Got it," the con man agreed. "I'll be extra careful." He then felt a tug on his jeans. Blinking, Skyler looked down.

"Sky, can Flip ask something?" Flipluck chirped, having finished his meal while the two were talking.

Kneeling down to eyelevel of the small mech, the youth nodded, "Sure, ask away."

Squealing in delight, with small clicks the sparkling asked, "What's a human bond like?"

"Human bond?" Skyler tilted his head. "Which part are you asking about, Flipluck?"

"Like 'spark feel'!" the small bot said as it held a part of its tiny chassis. "Spark sharing! Why do humans not have? You and White don't have. But Flip feel and share Sun's spark!"

Looking like a fish out of water, Skyler turned his attention to Sunstreaker, "Okay, I have no idea what's 'spark feel' or 'spark sharing' is all about…but I suppose they're connected to bonds. Could you explain it to me?" His voice was in 'plea mode' as he certainly did not want to be left clueless about it.

"Hmm, it's a bit tedious to explain," Sunny answered uncertainly. "In a way, because we have sparks, when we bond with someone or comfort another we can send feelings of encouragement, comfort, and such." The mech paused as he looked to his datatrax for an earth analogy. "It's comparable to how warm blood organics share body warmth, only it's based on the connection of emotions."

Skyler found it rather fascinating as he now found out that these sorts of 'spark bonds' seemed to be developed in different ways in the Cybertronian race than just amongst twins. "So does this connection apply to every Cybertronian or does it happen due to special circumstances?"

"Due to special circumstances," the warrior bot answered the human's question. "It usually applies to spark mates, creators and their sparklings, twins or at least sparkling caretakers. You probably can guess how I share a part of my spark with Flipluck although it is different from my connection to Sideswipe, which is stronger."

So basically these robotic organisms had a deep connection towards one another through sparks. Skyler assumed this what made them different from normal senseless and emotionless robots. The youth nodded at Sunny's explanation and then enlightened the sparkling, "Hmm, well- Humans don't have sparks, so we don't have a 'spark feel' or can share sparks."

Flipluck shook his small head. "But White always says humans have important bonds."

"We do," Skyler nodded with a smile. "It's just you can't see it and it doesn't have a physical feel like a spark."

Wailing and utterly confused, the sparkling held its head. "Don't understand!" Then, he looked to the larger mech, "Sun?"

"Nope, I have no idea how organic bonds work," Sunstreaker scowled. "Skyler, isn't this part for you to start explaining?" On the inside though, the mech was just as curious as the sparkling.

Skyler held his hands up in defense. "Alright, but give me a few seconds. My brain doesn't load as fast as you guys." He still had to figure out how to elaborate it without making the small sparkling more confused. It had to be simple and playful to grasp.

Remembering something he was taught as a kid, Skyler decided to teach it to Flipluck.

"Okay, let's try a quiz," the con man youth started.

"Ooh! Okay! Okay! Me guess!" The sparkling jumped up and down with excitement at the mere mention of a game.

Sunstreaker couldn't help but inwardly roll his optics. What was the human thinking? At least the human was good at getting the little bugger's attention. He watched silently as Skyler put out his hand.

"If I put out my hand, what do you do?"

Flipluck instantly replied with the right gesture, "Handshake!" They both shook hands.

This time Skyler put up his hand.

"High five!" And with that, Flipluck high-fived.

Lastly the young man balled his hand to a fist.

The small bot's faceplates frowned before he burst, "Fist bump!"

"Excellent. Nice job of guessing them all right, Flipluck," Skyler praised as they both bumped their fists.

"Yeah, I'm awesome!" the sparkling beamed.

"That's my line, runt," the larger mech grumbled.

The con man simply ignored the intrusion, "So what did we find out about humans and hand gestures?"

Flipluck's optics lit, "Humans use them to connect?"

"Good. Try guessing how that connects to human bonds," Skyler said.

This time the sparkling sulked, "No idea!"

"Sunstreaker, how about a guess?" the human faced the warrior bot.

After remembering everything, Sunny said, "You're trying to show where the bond is."

"Nice guess, you're correct," Skyler gave a thumbs up.

"Well, I'm best at these things, human," the Autobot said none too modestly.

Skyler only chuckled and sighed inwardly. It was no doubt the 'modest' part of what Flipluck learned was from the warrior mech. Even so, Skyler was intent to make sure Flipluck had good morals.

Still confused, Flipluck pulled on the con man's jeans again for attention. "Sky, don't understand. What did Sun mean?"

Giving his attention back to the small mech, Skyler instructed, "Okay, show me your hand when you do a fist bump."

Flipluck did so.

"Now visualize it as a human heart," Skyler continued. "But since it's closed there isn't a bond."

Curious, Sunstreaker watched how the human slowly used his own fingers to open the sparkling's small hand, finger by finger, until both hands were opened and touched in the form of a connected high five.

"The heart's opened!" Flipluck chirped happily.

"Yup, when the heart's opened, there's a bond. Yet, also remember, the palm is the heart of the human hand. Humans use hand gestures the most as a way to show where the bond is."

"So the bond is here?" the sparkling asked as he pointed out where both of their hands connected. "But if no hands together, no bond?"

Skyler shook his head, "Not really. Try taking away your hand." The sparkling took away his hand and so did Skyler. Then he asked again, "Is there still a bond between us?" the con man asked.

Flipluck blinked, "Yes, I know there's still a bond even though I don't see it." His tone was still confused. "Why?"

"Well, that's how the human bond works, Flipluck." Skyler said. "Our bonds exist as soon it's created and always remembered. So no matter where you go you always take a part of the bond you share with someone with you and they take yours too and you're always connected."

"So bond between me and White always there?" the small sparkling asked.

"Of course."

Blue optics, glowing a brilliant bright blue, twinkled as Flipluck tackle-hugged his human caretaker to the ground and squealed, "SO COOL! I understand now! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Skyler most AWESOME-EST human caretaker in the world!"

This made Skyler's face turn red as a tomato.

Sunstreaker perked at the human's reaction.

In that instant the warrior mech laughed.

_Hard._

The mech was now laughing audaciously at Skyler.

"Shut. Up. Sunstreaker," the embarrassed con man grumbled and muttered under his breath, as he was still pinned to the ground courtesy of Flipluck's tackle hug.

Still the mech didn't care and laughed on, making the con man's face go a deeper shade of red.

It was highly interesting to say the least as what he saw was something he never expected. True, Skyler had instinct like radars when it came to noticing someone who was going to deceive or lie from a mile away. However, what the mech found out at that moment, was that Skyler had a weakness to those who were genuinely truthful. So what if the human was a con man, thief, and liar; at least he wasn't heartless and even cared for those who were in need of a hand or help. Plus…

_Who would have thought a weakness of a person who deceives was pure innocence?_

The scene was priceless.

Getting up and lightly lifting the sparkling off him, Skyler quickly went to business mode to erase all the embarrassment away. "Hey, hey! I need to get to work soon. So, Flipluck, what are you doing today?"

The small bundle of wires looked up, thinking, then shrugged. "I don't know." However, as soon as he thought of something, he made a dash to his own bag of belongings.

Both of his human and mech caretakers only wondered what Flipluck had in store for them, although it was most likely Sunstreaker's job in agreeing what the sparkling was going to do for the day. What the two didn't expect for the small mech was to come back with a thin, tattered sketchbook. Considering it was in the morning and Skyler was going to leave soon, Flipluck gave it to his human caretaker.

Highly curious, Skyler opened the sketchbook to see what was inside.

The first few pages inside the sketchbook were no doubt what you would expect to see from a toddler of drawing stick figures. Nonetheless, as soon as they got towards the back the pictures were amazingly realistic, like photographic sketches. Many of the back drawings were parts of the casino and there was also a portrait sketch of White Eagle laughing. However, in all the pictures, there was something clearly missing.

"These look really great, Flipluck," Skyler commented. "Have you ever used colors?"

"No," the sparkling shook his head.

Skyler rubbed his chin, "I think I saw some used color pencils in the drawers. Let me get them."

With the little time both of them had, Skyler went into explaining about the basic color spectrum and how to mix colors. It was a simple lesson to make sure that Flipluck understood how to use color pencils.

Behind them, Sunstreaker watched the human carefully, as he was going to take over Skyler's lesson soon after. To an artist like Sunstreaker, he was rather surprised at the type of media humans used for art as it ranged to different utensils than just paint. For now, colored pencil was a good media, since Sunstreaker wouldn't have to worry about getting specs of paint on his exterior.

While Flipluck was practicing how to use color gradients, Skyler glanced at the mech and asked, "Are you okay that I'm going to leave you with this?"

A snort. "I'm not familiar with 'color pencils', but it seems humans don't have much of a difference when it comes to how the colors mix." Before Skyler asked any further, Sunny added, "I used to be a painter before the war."

Surprised at the revelation and feeling slightly sad as well, Skyler sighed, "I guess that makes the both of us. But better for Flipluck, he's got a paint master. No wonder you said my paintjob was adequate."

"Didn't I mention I never give feedback to the other bots?" Sunny inquired. "You're qualified enough to do my paint job and teach Flipluck on art. When was the last time you painted on a real canvas?"

Skyler was still surprised at Sunstreaker's sudden praise, but he answered the mech's question, "Nearly three years, just after Mission City incident."

"What was your last project?"

That of course was another surprise to the con man, but there was always a situation when an artist would stop doing their work because of a certain project that added to the reason why one would stop from ever painting completely.

Skyler sighed, "The last project I was doing was a painting of my sister. It was supposed to go on exhibit in a gallery the next day, after my parents and sister got back from Mission City". He shifted his feet uncomfortably before he asked, "You?"

"My paintings were on exhibit for the first day," Sunstreaker said in an uneasy and yet disappointed tone. "And on that first day, the war started and my whole city was left in rubble. Only Sides and I survived."

"Ironic how our fates are similar," the youth said in a sarcastic whisper as he knew it was pointless to say anything of sorry or sympathetic. He knew the mech wasn't asking for sympathy as Skyler would have felt. "Sunstreaker?"

"Yeah?"

"You think we could do a joint artwork when we get back with our twins again?" Skyler suggested. "Paint media, of course."

Sunstreaker thought for a moment. "Hmm, I suppose. What for?"

The human chuckled. "Well, someone's got to teach Flipluck how to do application with real paint. On the other hand, you were saying you were going to prank Prowl later on, right? We could do something positive before we hit the mark so we can stay low 'file until we execute the prank."

Oddly enough Sunny couldn't help but smile inwardly at the human's mastermind tendencies. "Not a bad plan. It's still going to be quite some time until we get back with our twins, though."

"Just because we're on a suicidal mission doesn't mean we have to drive ourselves insane," the con man said. "You're a lot better with Flipluck around."

"What's that supposed to mean?" a ridicule was coming from the car speakers.

Skyler laughed. "Well you could use the company of another Cybertronian. You seem a lot happier, mech."

Sunny hated to admit it, but the human was right. "Tch. It's not like humans are interesting in particular," the mech said, trying to shrug off the human's comments.

"And a sparkling is?" Skyler grinned.

"Not a WORD, human!"

"Skyler blackmailing!" Flipluck giggled, pointing at the human.

No doubt this caused the human to go pale. _Oh CRAP._

"Where did you learn THAT word?" the mech asked accusingly to Flipluck about the 'B' word (blackmail) he had been trying to avoid saying since he became Flipluck's caretaker.

The sparkling innocently shrugged. "You mumbled in your sleep when I slept in your interior. Didn't know what it meant, so I asked Skyler."

Before Sunstreaker could mutter a word and set his sights on the con man, the human had disappeared altogether from the garage and was already on the lawn moving very fast like a thief would be under the chase of authorities.

"COME BACK HERE!"

Skyler wasted no time on focusing his legs to full speed in getting away from the mech, leaving him to his sparkling sitter duties yet again. "Bye guys! See you at lunch!"

The warrior bot grumbled over how stupid he could be and how Skyler just had to make the situation worse. There was no backing out now when it came to this. At least, with the sparkling was testing out these color pencils, he could have a little peace in the morning. However, Sunstreaker's peace of mind was disrupted as about 45 minutes later when Flipluck grew bored and decided to turn on the television screen in the garage.

"Oooh! Barney!" Flipluck said with glee, his arms waving in joy.

With the TV on a moderate volume level and Sunstreaker's good hearing, the mech couldn't help but shudder, twitch, and cringe when the song of 'Barney the Purple Dinosaur' came blaring from the speakers.

The mech heavily rolled his optics.

_UGH._

_URK._

_PRIMUS…_

_What did I do to DESERVE THIS?_

As much as he wanted to drive FAR away from the torturous garage or SHOOT the bloody micro television screen, Sunny could not. It wouldn't set a good example for the sparkling, and there was simply no way he would leave Flipluck on his own. Surely there was another way to stop this torture?

_Hang on an astro-second…_

He shut off his audio receptors and finally felt at peace. Sunstreaker wasn't going to complain about the sparkling tapping on his exterior later on (Skyler could fix scratches later); at least he didn't have to hear the sing-along on some singing dorky purple dinosaur. _Stupid human children entertainment channel, I'll shift it to a better one later on._ The show was going to last for an hour because it was an 'hour special' as the channel called it.

In the meantime, Sunstreaker had other things he could do, like going over those data files that the human gave him on the types of encoding humans used. He still needed to do his fair share on taking on Soundwave while Skyler did the Intel collecting and kept his eyes and ears open for anything suspicious going on through human communications.

Even as he went through the history of human codes, he wondered what Sideswipe was doing back at base with the other Autobots.

Skyler did mention that Steve was a bit livelier than he (Skyler) was…

_I have a feeling Sides is going to enjoy his time with Steve very soon._

_Lucky 'aft, at least he doesn't need to take care of a small little bugger._

Looking at the sparkling, who was now imitating a stupid (in Sunstreaker's optics) dance the purple dinosaur was doing with the other smaller fleshlings, the warrior was intent on messaging through a Blackberry he had near the table to Skyler about OTHER channel alternatives that would distract Flipluck into NEVER watching the purple dinosaur EVER again.

_If Grimlock ever changes his exterior to the color purple and if I see him in that color, I'll GLADLY shoot him, Dinobot or NOT._

* * *

_Meanwhile at the US Nevada NEST BASE…_

"Where's Steve?"

Everyone in the Autobot hanger turned their heads towards the ex-Sector Seven agent.

"Has anyone seen Steve?" he repeated himself more loudly this time.

Sideswipe, who was also interested in the answer to that question, stayed silent, finishing the last drops of his energon cube as the others - Autobot and human alike – murmured negative replies.

"Not since this mornin'," Jazz replied. Then his gaze shifted as he remembered, "He seemed rather intent on doing something since he was in a hurry."

Simmons sighed, "Does anyone know where he is right now? He promised me he'd do at least a couple of pages in cracking the code that the _Furta duo_ hackers did for today."

Robert Epps leaned to one side as he stood. "I saw him jog early in the morning about 5 am or something, but that's it. Dunno where he is right now. Major?"

Will Lennox shook his head, "Nope. I only saw him in the mess hall for breakfast, but I did see a couple of those papers you mentioned. It seems he was working on them." The Major frowned. "Where's Prowl?" It was strange that the strategist was absent from decoding work.

"In the Med Bay," Simmons sighed irritably. "Ratchet's having another fit as someone stuck flyers of irrational sentences, poems, quotes, and prose all over his berth and when he woke up and saw them, his logical glitch went loco (crazy)."

Hearing that, most of the other bots and humans chuckled and laughed, although Jolt's laughter was the loudest.

Sideswipe, realizing who was responsible for the crime, changed to his alt-form and slowly, not attracting the attention of the others, rolled out of the hanger.

Robowarrior pointed at the blue bot accusingly, "Jolt, did you prank on him?"

The bot with whips shook his head, still laughing, "No, but I wish I thought of it." He added, "Besides, I'm innocent since I was on patrol this morning with Sideswipe and Ironhide."

"Sorry, Simmons," Ironhide said gruffly in support. "Both of them were with me."

Simmons looked at the minor twins, "Tweedledee and Tweedledum?"

"Naw-uh, we wouldn't do dat!" Skids complained.

"Yeah! We just got on base with Leo!" his twin Mud Flap added.

Sam chuckled, "Come on, Simmons. They can't even read. It's not the type of prank they could pull off." There was complaint with a 'Hey!' and they were going to try make a grab for the human Prime, but Bumblebee snagged them both and threw them to the other side of the hanger, away from his charge. Leo of course didn't comment on the behavior of his guardians and looked rather thankful instead.

"Well, Arcee, Chromia, Flare-up, Wheelie, and I were at the training grounds," Mikaela added to the list of innocent bystanders. "Wheeljack and Hound haven't left the lab since yesterday, Ratchet plus Red Alert are in the Med Bay, and Mirage is with Bluestreak and Fig on patrol right now."

Simmons sighed. It was nigh impossible that the Autobot leader did it and he was off to meet the Sec. Def on the other side of the base. "Fine, do whatever you were doing," and he walked off.

_Looks like I'm going to have to find the kid myself. Who cares who did that to Prowl; I'll work on the codes myself with the kid if I have to._

Meanwhile, outside of the hanger, Sideswipe rolled slowly around the buildings on base as he scanned around, looking for a certain hacker. To the warrior bot who was a master of pranks himself, it wasn't actually that hard to figure out who the culprit of frying Prowl's circuits was. Not that he would tell the others anyway, the bot was curious about the reason why the young hacker pranked the strategist. On the other hand, having the human as a person to talk to was refreshing for him.

During the past few days, even though he was busy, Steve had somehow to manage to drop by and at least talk to him for a few minutes each day. While Sideswipe had never considered having a human companion, the hacker was one human he could talk about his missing twin without remorse, as, instead of on focusing on the fact that Sunny was missing, they tended to chat about happier things. It was a break for them both that they weren't alone in all of this, and in a way it mended the pain of missing their absent twins.

As his scanners beeped on positive, Sideswipe made his way to the intended location. He eventually saw the human hacker lying on top of the large storage facility building, looking at the sky with an expression that said he was at peace and not disturbed by anyone. The warrior bot was confused as to how in Primus the human got up there by himself without the help of an Autobot. Once he was beside the building, he transformed to his bi-pedal mode.

Hearing the transformation, Steve sat up and smiled at the bot, "Hey, Sideswipe, how are you?"

"Fine as usual," Sideswipe said absently. His head leaned to the side, "How did you get up there?"

"I climbed," Steve grinned, not giving any clues. Well, he wasn't called a con man for nothing. What thief didn't know what places to climb to get in or out of a place they were going to rob?

Sideswipe rolled his optics. "Odd human."

"So, what brings you here?" the hacker asked, flipping through the papers on his clipboard.

"You pranked Prowl with all those irrational flyers, did you?" the warrior bot questioned.

Steve smiled and gave him the thumbs up. "Well done, mech. I'm guilty as charged. You're here to throw me into the brig?"

Sides sighed, "Pit, no. The brig is for the bots, Steve." Then his tone changed into curiosity, "Why did you prank him anyway? And how did you know about Prowl's logic glitch?"

"Well, he kind of pissed me off," Steve said in a huff. "And as for the logic glitch, I overheard Simmons talking about it yesterday."

The warrior bot raised an optic ridge, requesting an explanation from the hacker.

"Fine! Yesterday we went over the hacker's code and all but... He made the whole subject of hacking so boring!" Steve exclaimed with his hands out in frustration. "I swear, I've never been SO BORED IN MY ENTIRE LIFE and he made something I'm passionate about sound like it was the most boring thing in the universe!"

Sideswipe laughed at the human's whining, "No one gave you a heads up on his ability to drone on and on about things, did they?"

A snort. "No. Well, it's not going to kill him off anyway, so I'm not apologizing for it."

The warrior bot chuckled, "Hey, I'm not pushing you or anything. I'll keep it quiet."

The youth blinked, "You will?"

"Yeah, it's not like I haven't been a victim of his 'boredom of doom' lectures," Sideswipe answered. "The one who usually makes sure to keep him in check is usually Prime, Jazz, and Ironhide if he's in the mood."

Steve perked at that, "Just how long does Prowl go on with those lectures?"

A simple reply. "Hours."

The youth nodded with a pale face as he imagined being stuck in a room for hours with Prowl.

Involuntarily he shuddered.

_That must be one heck of a PSYCHOLOGICAL NIGHTMARE._

"Steve?"

"What?"

"Next time Prowl does that to you, count me in," Sideswipe grinned.

Steve was surprised at the statement at first, but soon smirked eagerly at that, "It's a deal. I wouldn't want a better prank partner, mech."

"Thanks," the bot said with pride and added, "How about we get you off of there before anyone sees that I'm here with you and blame me for getting you up there and in danger." He then opened his hand to let Steve come to it.

"Oh, sorry about that," the youth apologized as he scratched his head sheepishly.

He looked to the robotic palm with wariness. Steve was hesitant at first, but then with a bit of courage to trust the mech, he walked over into the mech's hand and held onto his thumb for support as he was lowered to the ground. As soon it was low enough, Steve hopped to the ground with ease.

_Well, that wasn't so bad._

"By the way, Simmons was looking for you," Sides mentioned. "You got the codes done?"

The youth held up his clipboard, "As much as I can do it manually. It's a fraction of it, but it's progress. I thought I could get some fresh air after being inside for too long. I'm starting to feel claustrophobic." Steve sighed, "It's not like they want me to go anywhere near the computers when I'm inside. They're afraid I might start hacking in."

"Would you?" Sides winked in question with a mischievous smile.

Noticing his lie got burnt by a mile, Steve sighed as he huffed, "Crap. You saw through that, didn't you?" The bot nodded as the hacker face-palmed his head. "Am I that obvious?"

Sides laughed and said proudly, "No, I'm just good at noticing who's a prankster and who's not. No one else has suspected you of anything yet."

"Hope so," the hacker said, relieved. "It's not like I don't trust all the Autobots or the other military guys. I mean... You've all been helpful, it's... I can't... I just have issues when it comes to government people; especially Galloway."

While Sideswipe understood that most people hated Galloway \ a great deal, the warrior was rather curious as to why the human in front of him had trust issues. "What issues are you having problems with?"

Steve sighed, "The fact that I still feel angry that I've been lied to. Especially when it comes to how my parents and sister died in Mission City '07; I know it was for the good of the public, but... It somewhat bites the dust, kind of like I want to forgive, but I can't."

"And about Galloway?" Sideswipe questioned. He knew that the boy's trust for the government was expected, but he was curious to see why Steve seemed to be wary of the liaison.

Hesitant, Steve said, "I've only heard rumors of that guy, but if anything, none of those rumors are good." He added, "Some say Galloway did a lot of nasty things to get into the position he is now. Not that you can see it in his official data files since he's keeping his hands clean for the world to see."

"You seem to know something about everything," the warrior bot remarked.

"I get that habit from Skyler because he's an info junkie," Steve shrugged. "He's the type of liking to know a bit of everything. So Sideswipe- You doing anything right now?"

"It's my time off, so I'm not on duty till another few hours or so. You, on the other hand, should complete all the codes you promised yesterday and today's work."

Steve only smiled, "Sorry to burst your bubble, but I'm pretty much done for today." And with that he flicked the papers, indicating he'd finished his work that consisted of today's work also.

"So you're able to break those codes," Sides concluded. This somewhat aroused his suspicions on the reason why this human was kidnapped in the first place.

The hacker sighed, "Yeah, I overworked myself so I can hide and get some air outside. I don't like being cooped inside at a desk all day. I just needed to get some space to myself to lighten my head." Steve then huffed, "Since there's nothing really fun to do after I set up the prank for Prowl, I guess I'm going to stick outside for a while."

Feeling bored as well and in need of a healthy dose of entertainment, Sideswipe's gears in his head went into motion, and a light bulb came out. "How about you and me do a prank right now?"

Steve blinked and tilted his head, "Now?" He didn't believe he was hearing this. Then again, maybe he shouldn't be surprised. This mech did call himself a master in pranks.

"Yeah!" Sideswipe said eagerly, "I haven't done a prank in ages. The last time I did one with Sunny was on Big Boss. We just had to make for the big one before we were stationed at Tyger Pax." A chuckle erupted from the mech as he said, "Most of the other bots then said it was 'botslaughter' but everyone managed to laugh it out before we went for the large battle. Even Big Boss ended up laughing too."

The mech looked at the human that was gazing up at him, "I think I could pull another one off, but I need a bit of your help."

While Steve wasn't sure how he was going to help in assisting the large mech in a prank, he did want to pass the time by doing something other than staring into space. Plus he still owed the mech his life; helping the mech get into a better mood was part of his way of paying Sideswipe back. Add in the fact it would be fun to see how a Cybertronian prank worked, he couldn't really say no.

The con man then laughed, "Well, Sideswipe, humans do have a saying that 'you can't spell slaughter without laughter'. Count me in. So- Who's _the mark_?"

Sideswipe smirked and transformed to his alt-form, then opened his door as sign of welcome, "I know just the mech. Hop in!"

Steve nodded and entered inside Sideswipe's interior warily. He was startled when a hologram flashed into existence in the driver's seat. "Holoform?"

"Yeah," Sides nodded. "You overheard from whom?"

"Prowl."

"Hmm, shame he doesn't get to see what we're going to do now," the blond young man holoform of Sides said with a grin.

It was weird for Steve to actually see the mech's holoform steer his own body and found it rather disturbing, but he didn't comment on it. "Where are we going to get supplies?"

"From another prankster in crime," Sideswipe said with a thrill. "Jolt. He's a medic in training, but he can be persuaded. Don't worry, you still have an important part to play."

Steve raised a brow as he was certain it had to do with codes, "I'm getting the feeling I'm needed for something only someone who's as small as me can do. Does it involve hacking?"

"Sabotage is the best word, Steve," the holoform Sideswipe winked at him.

_Well, he hadn't had any fun in quite a while._

_What better place to enhance con man skills than fool the military that had the best security?_

Steve was itching to get his fingers on a computer keyboard very soon.

* * *

_Back at Oakley…_

Browsing around in a craft shop, the spiky haired con man suddenly felt giddy, as if he was planning to nick something or prank someone. Skyler was positive those feelings weren't his, since he was in a shop, intent on _buying_ something, not stealing, to keep his cover from being blown. Simply put, these community type towns or cities were the easiest places to be spotted as a criminal. While there wasn't a public man hunt for him yet he was very sure that certain people from the military would be after him soon.

One conclusion was certain, it was his twin.

If that was the case, then Skyler couldn't help but feel happy for his brother. He had suspicions that Sideswipe was behind it, but it was probably for the best.

Resuming his search through the store, the con man found what he was looking for, sketchbooks. Since Flipluck's was old and tattered, Skyler decided that the small mech should try a binder sketchbook so the papers didn't fall out. He then bought new color pencils as well as other drawing things the sparkling might need and headed towards the cashier.

"Well if it isn't Skyler!" the lady cashier said in a motherly tone.

Skyler blinked as he tried to remember her. "Err… Mrs. Nathan?" The woman nodded.

Inwardly the con man called himself an idiot for forgetting his current boss' wife's name. _Don't even think about forgetting something like that AGAIN._ Sure, he wasn't like Steve when it came to the memory department, but that didn't mean he could slack off. If he wasn't careful it could mean trouble. And to a con man, details also meant survival.

"Pleasure meeting you here, is this your store?" Skyler said politely in 'diversion mode'.

The lady smiled. "Well, dear, it's actually a joint business between a few mothers in this town. How do you like it?"

"I think it's really amazing," Skyler said truthfully. Besides, this craft shop did have just about nearly everything.

"Thank you!" Mrs. Nathan said enthusiastically. "My, who might these be for?" she added as she totaled the sum for the items on the table.

Skyler didn't like people who tried to get know him personally, especially the gossip type. They were rather dangerous for a con man to be hanging around with, unless you were looking for information. Even so, for now, he might as well play along. "It's a gift for someone." He pretty much left it at that.

Oddly enough the woman kept on nodding and smiling at him. "Oh! A surprise gift! How wonderful!" she squealed. "You're a very kind person, Skyler. My husband is thrilled; you made some of our customers very happy with your paint job works on some of our trucks in town!"

And as the woman kept on babbling on about his current helpings around town for the majority of his stay, Skyler was feeling rather regretful that he was a con man. He liked helping people, but at times he was sure to make other people disappointed in him once they knew he was a con man. The only ones that accepted him for what and who he was were family and a few close friends. However, the weirdest thing for him was that he was accepted by both Sunstreaker and Flipluck.

Sunstreaker wasn't concerned at all about his wrong doings on stealing, but the con man knew all too well how his views were affected by war. So, basically the warrior mech wasn't the type to follow rules and such.

The sparkling Flipluck, on the other hand, was something Skyler did not expect. Flipluck seemed to know that stealing and even trickery was wrong but instead seemed to admire him in ways even Skyler wasn't certain of himself. Perhaps White Eagle was behind it somehow, the Native American casino mogul did have high respects when it came to the honest con artists. Nevertheless, when it came to questions, Flipluck seemed to have a liking to ask him instead of the mech for answers.

"Alright, that will be 40 dollars, dear."

Snapped back into reality, Skyler paid for the items and took the bag. "Thanks."

"You're welcome. Come back if you need everything," Mrs. Nathan said.

Just as Skyler was going to walk out, he abruptly stopped at a small donation stall that was in the store. What caught his attention was not what the donations were for, but one picture that was hung up on the wall. While the drawing was not exactly neat and what you would expect from a beginner, it looked very familiar.

It looked like Flipluck.

To add the fact that many of the sketches on the pin up board contained that particular small robot picture playing cards was more than enough to make Skyler gape. The youth was so shocked by the pictures that when Mrs. Nathan tapped him on the shoulder, he yelped.

"Sorry to frighten you, Skyler. It's just you seem taken by the drawings."

_Getting freaked out by a store clerk. Ha-ha._

_Damn it, I'm already getting rusty…_

Feeling slightly nervous and hoping another weird thing was not about to happen, he asked, "Who drew these pictures?"

"You didn't read the stall signs?" she asked, rather disappointed.

"Umm…no, I was kind of distracted," the youth said, scratching his head in embarrassment, and quickly added, "Sorry."

"Tiffany Stephan, she's 11 years old, she used to come here every time with a smile on her face," Mrs. Nathan sighed. "The poor girl, she's now at the hospital and sick."

"Sick?" Skyler asked.

Mrs. Nathan nodded, "She has a rare disease, but the cost for her operations is so high her family could not afford it." The women heaved another sigh of despair and showed the youth a photo of the girl, "Two hundred thousand dollars is a large amount of cash, but a life is worth any amount of money. I put that stall here so I could help her."

Studying the picture drawn by the girl, Skyler questioned, "Why does she draw the little robot so much?"

"Tiffany always said she dreams about playing with the little robot," Mrs. Nathan said in a sad tone. "She believes one day she'll play with her little robot friend." But quickly she looked at Skyler and said, "If you could, would you like to make a donation?"

"How do I make a donation?"

Quickly, the woman went into the details. While it was possible to directly transfer money via a bank account, there was another way that caught Skyler's interest. Apparently the girl made decorative jars that people could put their money in, or whatever they wished to put in them like 'get well soon' cards, gifts, etc. Then, all the donator had to do was leave it at the hospital.

Without much thinking, Skyler took a jar that had decorations of fairies and a violin on it.

"Such an odd choice for a young man like you," Mrs. Nathan commented. "You have an eye for what she likes."

Skyler shrugged. "I suppose a donation is a gift, too. Since she's a girl, I suppose it's fitting. I'll get this to the hospital soon."

"Thank you, Skyler!"

Without further ado, the youth left the store with many things on his mind, most concerning the jar in his hand and Mrs. Nathan's incredible story.

_Was this all really a coincidence?_

Without a doubt, his con man instincts were screaming: _hell_ NO.

The idea of Flipluck playing with a human child was alright with Skyler, but he was rather cautious about the secrecy of the bots. He knew very well fate was playing with him or at least giving him a sign it was important in the days to come, yet he couldn't put his finger on why things happened this way.

Yet for some reason this opportunity appeared in front of him and clearly showed that he had a part in it. He sighed, looking at the jar in his hand. Fairies and the violin were some of Scarlet's favorite things in the whole world. Maybe his sister wanted to tell him that he could somehow help this girl out. Why, Skyler did not understand. Perhaps doing the right thing didn't need a reason.

With still another hour till lunch and nothing pressing to take care of (his boss Mr. Nathan gave him the day off for his good work on a previous client), Skyler headed towards a private safety deposit service and opened an anonymous account. He only mentioned to the safety deposit provider he was doing it for a donation purpose. As soon as he was done, he filed in and transferred the 200 grand that was enough to cover the operations cost and was given a check of the money he stored.

It was a generous thing to do, but Skyler also had slightly selfish reasons for doing it. He wanted to make his con man life in to something better. The girl needed that money more than he did; although it was somewhat an irony the girl had the same name as his mother.

_Why were all the family things coming on and on like this when he was most alone?_

Skyler sighed and shook his head out of those sorrowful thoughts.

Not now.

He needed to focus on what was important, and that was to make up for the things he couldn't do in the past.

The funny thing was this sort of charity reminded the con man of Uncle Danny using the stolen diamonds from Terry Bennedict during the Bank Hotel heist they did. Terry somehow managed to do a blitz (backstab) and get his back on Uncle Danny by sending the Night Fox after their stolen diamonds. Thankfully the Night Fox failed as Danny saw him coming from a mile a way and replaced them with fakes. In return though, Uncle Danny sold the real ones on the black market and donated it to foster children under Terry's name that soon landed him (Terry) on the Oprah Winfrey Show.

Way to go for Uncle Danny in making his opponent the good guy while still leaving the poor dude with a bruised ego.

Skyler wasn't going to regret it as he still had a good sum of money from his winnings, not to mention a pay raise from Mr. Nathan. He wasn't going to worry about money, since he could always steal more later on.

Once everything was done, he slipped the check into the jar, and headed towards the hospital via public transport. At the hospital Skyler gave the jar to the receptionist, then left quickly before anyone could open the jar while he was there. Hopefully the family would be happy to have their daughter's life back. As for lunch, he bought a smoked beef sandwich and juice from a Seven Eleven outlet before making his way back home.

Entering the house, he called his usual "I'm home!", expecting a jump from the sparkling or at least a rev from the mech in the garage. Yet, that noon the house was disturbingly quiet and even the television was off. Skyler looked at the doorknob knowing that it hadn't been forced or picked and none of the household items had been disturbed.

"Sunstreaker? Flipluck?"

There was no answer.

_Something was definitely wrong._

Now worried, Skyler headed towards the garage.

As he entered the lights were off, the mech was unfamiliarly silent and Flipluck was nowhere to be seen, but his laptop was opened. Disturbed and guarded, Skyler walked slowly towards the laptop and only saw the login screen. Whoever came here, they were trying to get into his laptop.

The next thing he knew he was grabbed from behind.

"Wha-"

The youth was violently shoved back and nearly lost his balance. On fighting reflex and seeing a punch coming his way, Skyler controlled himself from falling over and swiftly as he could, grabbed onto the other's wrist in attempt to throw his attacker off course. What he didn't expect was to have the attacker positioning his own hands on his (Skyler's) wrists and was using his momentum to put the youth to the ground.

_Shit!_

_This guy knows Aikido!_

As Skyler was going to hit the ground, he did only thing he could do, which was to use his legs to soften the fall into a back roll position. He grunted to the ground in pain but was not going to give up without a good fight. In a few rounds of punching, kicking, and trying to get the other pinned to the ground, Skyler's mind was racing as this person he was fighting was a professional fighter. The attacker's techniques were calculated, not wasted, and far stronger than his own. He had never felt so overwhelmed before. In the end he was in a position where his arm was twisted to his back and there was a sound that he knew too well.

**   
_'Click.'_   
**

A handgun was pointed right on his head.

"Don't move," a hoarse whisper came from his attacker.

Skyler didn't, he knew he'd be an idiot to. He might as well listen to whatever his attacker wanted for now. He wasn't going to let Sunstreaker get his cover blown, nor reveal the fact that the sparkling was maybe hiding in the garage. The con man hoped that Flipluck was safe.

Sunstreaker watched helplessly while the human was pinned to the ground. He felt furious that this other fleshling was threatening the human he considered as a brother, yet he knew the human wasn't counting on his help as Skyler had always stressed to him that by all accounts if this sort of thing ever happened the mech was to make sure they only knew him as a car and not an extraterrestrial. Looking around he found Flipluck in bipedal form peeking from behind a tool cabinet. He only hoped the small runt stayed there as he was told.

The small bundle of wires shivered silently as his human caretaker was pinned to the ground. Flipluck couldn't stand seeing Sky being held with a gun to his head. It was a feeling he never had felt before, he was angry but he wanted to protect his caretaker too. Picking up an idea from the cartoons he watched on the television, he decided he would help. Without a thought, he charged.

Faster than the attacker could react, and aided by the darkness, Flipluck jumped and covered the other's eyes.

Feeling metal fingers on his face, the attacker panicked, which gave Skyler an opportunity to elbow the attacker in the face and grabbed the sparkling off in fear for the younger bot's safety. However, things were not at the con man's advantage as the attacker still had the gun in his hand and they were both targeted. To protect Flipluck, Skyler stood on his knees in front of the sparkling, shielding the small mech with his body.

Flipluck whimpered as he knew what Skyler was doing.

His caretaker was doing a 'human shield', the sparkling was aware that Skyler was going to risk his life for him.

Now extremely furious that this other fleshling was threatening both Skyler and Flipluck, Sunstreaker decided to act. Sunny immediately blared his horn, making the smaller occupants of the room hiss at the sound volume before transforming so fast that even Skyler saw it all in a blur.

The next thing he knew, Skyler was protectively behind one of Sunstreaker's blades while the other was pointed at the attacker.

"Press on the light button, _fleshling_," Sunstreaker loomed over the man with a voice so furious that it startled Skyler and the sparkling into shuddering. "I WON'T take a NO for an answer!"

The con man was sure the other man's hand was trembling even if he was still pointing a gun at the bot but soon enough he found the light switch.

Dark spots were dancing in Skyler's eyes at first as he tried to adapt his eyes to the light. Then, before he could say anything else, his attacker spoke first.

"Skyler?" the stranger asked unbelievingly, having recognized the other.

Skyler's eyes went wide at the voice and finally focused on the face of the other person. "Uncle Robert?"

"WHAT?" the mech shouted astonished. "He's YOUR UNCLE?"

Very confused, Flipluck allowed his curiosity to overcome his fear. He scratched his head, walked over to the larger bot, and tugged on the mech's nearest wheel. "Sun, what's an uncle?"

* * *

Sam Witwicky sighed happily as his meeting for today was over. After a successful attempt on negotiations concerning the welfare of the bots, he was feeling that he did a good job in making things work smoother in the long run for their war with the Decepticons. Beside him was his beautiful and amazing girlfriend Mikaela. They were both walking towards where the Autobot Leader was conversing with their guardian, Bumblebee.

"Sam," his brother Prime greeted, fondness rolling over their bond. "I see that the negotiations have gone well."

"It's one victory," the brunette nodded with a smile. "There's still plenty ahead."

_"Well done, man! You're awesome!" _'Bee said through a track from a random film.

"Thanks, 'Bee," Sam said for the compliment. "So, did Simmons finally manage to find Steve?"

"Yes. Steve soon came back to him. He said he was out for a walk because he was feeling claustrophobic," Optimus said with an amused voice. "However, before Simmons could ask him to work on more of the codes by the Furta duo, he disappeared again."

Mikaela raised a brow at the Autobot Commander. "Does it mean he was able to crack the codes and find out what the original hackers did?"

Optimus shook his head. "It is uncertain. He said he only finished what he was asked to do. The papers are now with both Simmons and Major Lennox for analysis."

"That's odd, I can't really imagine Simmons not finding a guy when he wants to," Sam voiced his thoughts out loud. "Steve must be really good at avoiding him; usually he knows where everyone is on the base."

Mikaela giggled, "Well, Sam. At least there's someone at the base who's now good at avoiding Simmons. You should learn from him, and we might just be able to take a longer break from your meetings."

The human Prime sighed at his girlfriend's blunt statement. She was right. Since this Furta duo incident his meetings had increased by a good number because of Simmons' obsession on tracking all things alien to him; even if the 'alien' thing was in fact two human hackers who had somehow miraculously developed a coding system that scared away the Intel Decepticon officer who was a ruthless and high ranking 'Con. Still, while he had no idea who the hackers were, Steve was also his responsibility for the moment, and he had to keep an eye out for the other Autobots too.

"How's Sideswipe doing?" Sam asked. "I heard Steve seems to be taken by him."

Prime smiled. "Better than I would ever have expected. He's not as distraught as before. Ratchet reports that although Steve cannot be a replacement for his twin, his presence has a positive effect on Sideswipe."

"No changes in the 'fight first, talk later' department?" Sam joked.

The Prime chuckled, "That for certain won't happen in the next millennia, at least not easily, Sam." Of course he knew Sideswipe wouldn't be himself if he stopped doing that completely when it came to the Decepticons.

In front of them were the training grounds and at that time of day the place was filled with Autobots of all shapes and sizes. Sam admired them from afar, watching who was doing what. An interesting fight was happening between Ironhide and his mate Chromia who both were displaying an amazing death dance. Nearly all the others were in their own sparring sessions, including Wheeljack and Hound who were out of the lab for once. Ratchet was around to keep an eye out for injuries.

Sam noted that Red Alert, Jolt, Sideswipe, and the smaller twins were missing.

**'BOOM!'**

A large amount of white smoke exploded from the building that served as Wheeljack's upper lab (there's another underground).

This of course startled all those who were on the training grounds as they took cover, but once the smoke started to clear, a human appeared in its midst.

Steve was coughing a bit, but he didn't seem to be suffering. Instead he seemed rather smug about himself as he jogged out of the smoke area.

A mech coming out of the smoke fell down on his 'aft and pointed towards what was inside the smoke.

Everyone thought something had gone seriously wrong….

Until they found out that the mech, Red Alert was…laughing.

Sideswipe skated on his wheels from outside the smoke, grinning madly, "See? I told you that you'll like it! It's great piece of art!"

Of course many would suspect where that came from.

The crowd looked again as the white smoke was falling down instead of upwards. Once the wisps of frozen air were gone, something else came into view - the smaller set of twins.

Just behind them was a larger canister and compressor of liquid nitrogen.

They were frozen in a block of ice in a not so comfortable position that the humans would call a ballerina dance. The fact they had on tutus carved from ice and were decorated with white popsicles that looked like water was swirling around them was crazy, and it belied logic how Sideswipe had managed to carve such a thing with his double blades. However the best thing of any art was the title.

The thick bold block ice letters carved in front of them read, 'SWAN LAKE'.

Soon both Sideswipe and Steve joined in Red Alert's laugher.

The laughter was contagious.

Everyone who was there laughed.

_With an exception of the owner of the lab._

Wheeljack frowned. "How did you get into my lab? I was sure that only I knew the codes and the only port that could be used to enter the code to it was only-" A pause. "…small enough for a human to operate."

Still smirking and rolling his optics Sideswipe said, "Got a bit of help, of course. Couldn't have done it without Steve, besides, I thought Steve was itching to get his fingers on a computer…so, we compromised."

Everyone looked at Steve, but he shrugged innocently, "I still owe Sides."

Wheeljack didn't seem too happy about inspecting the destruction of the lab (frozen all over inside), despite being glad to see Sideswipe back to his old self.

"Sorry, 'Jack. Steve's coming with me," Sideswipe carefully swiped the human into his hands and escaped before Ratchet started to think about throwing a wrench.

"Sideswipe! Come back here! What did I say about handling humans!" Ratchet roared after them. He wasn't exactly happy with the twins' conditions as it meant more work for him. "You're going to be the one to clean that up and unfreeze them!"

The warrior mech didn't look like he cared and the human in his hand was enjoying the thrill ride, laughing and even yelling 'Woohoo!' as Sideswipe skated away on his wheels, making his lofty escape.

Jolt walked over to Ironhide and whispered something, making the weapons specialist snigger.

Recovering from his laugh, Epps shook his head, "I've never seen Sideswipe really laugh or even smile before!"

"He hasn't done so in eons. Not after Sunny was absent," Jazz agreed, still laughing. "Gotta say, Steve's a special human to actually get Sides to do a prank again. Much less Red Alert from his sober mood when it came to Sides; but by the looks of it, things are turning out well."

"So things weren't well between Sides and Red Alert before?" Sergeant Epps asked. His curiosity piped up, "Now you mention it, Red Alert always avoided Sides, even when it came to the Med Bay."

Jazz nodded, "It was Red Alert who took away Sideswipe from the battlefield during the battle of Tyger Pax. Sunstreaker ordered him to as 'Swipe was heavily injured. You could say he blames himself for it and Sideswipe's condition right now. It's why he's a medic now instead of his real position as the Autobots' Security Officer."

Epps looked at the brighter side of things. "But with a prank like that, surely Sides wanted the bot to cheer up and not blame it on himself."

"Couldn't agree more!" Jazz exclaimed. Perhaps being on earth with humans was in fact the best remedy for the Autobots.

On the other side of the training grounds, safe from prank boundaries, another audience was watching the show.

Sam smiled at the Autobot leader and brother Prime. "Seems like your plan has worked."

"Indeed," Optimus said with a smile. As much as he was happy for the younger mech, he hoped that Sunstreaker was safe no matter where he was. There was still a lingering feeling on what if the elder twin had come back, would Sunstreaker accept Sideswipe's new human friend? For now, it wouldn't matter - at least now two of his warriors were in better spirits than they had ever been…. As well as a lesson learned for the smaller set of twins.

"But do you think it's wise to put two pranksters together?" Sam asked but grinned at the same time. "You never know about the damage costs if you look at it in another way."

Optimus raised an optic ridge as in the background Bumblebee was playing a laughing track at him.

The Commander shrugged nonchalantly.

Sam only chuckled and lightly told his guardian, "Come on 'Bee, enough teasing the Big Guy."

Ironhide walked over to Red Alert still inside the prank boundary area, "So, as the humans say, have you 'lightened up'?"

"Yes," He nodded, still smiling. "I think I'll try to take the Security Officer position again sometime soon." Knowing that Sideswipe had forgiven him, it was best to move on.

The weapons specialist gave a hand and pulled the other mech up, "Glad to have you back as a better mech. And I suppose we owe a favor to Steve since he's helped Sideswipe as well. Although, I can't say anything about the other set of twins."

Jolt piped in jokingly, "Permission to unfreeze the twins, Ironhide?"

A snort came from the weapons specialist. "No. Let them be, I still have a grudge from when they sneaked into my berth and touched my weapon cleaner tools. Let Ratchet deal with it later."

While Major Lennox was smiling with the others because of the prank, he caught Simmons pouring over the codes.

"Holy shit! Lord, this kid's crazy!" Simmons exclaimed more to himself.

Frowning, the major asked, "What do you mean?"

Simmons only showed the papers, although Will sure hadn't got a clue what he was talking about. "The kid's a genius! He's gotten through most of these codes! Not even the pentagon Intel groupies got through them in a month."

"Really?"

The ex-agent nodded, "Keep the kid here, Major, he's a real deal for codes. Plus…looks like our resident warrior is far more productive with him around, too." He soon jogged over inside to see how the codes would fit in the NEST computer servers.

Major Lennox soon also realized Steve had managed to hack into the door code to Wheeljack's lab (even though it was the only upper level which was the least guarded). Not even an expert hacker could do that easily.

_Steve's one scary kid. No wonder the crime syndicate wanted him._

The fact that Steve was with Sideswipe was a rather disturbing thought with how much damage they could do, even though their first prank had been a good laugh.

* * *

Skyler's head was filled with swear words so many that if he'd said them all out loud, he was certain that the mech would shoot him for saying them all in front of a sparkling.

_I'm so shit screwed for my whole entire life!_

Out of all the times he'd expected the farfetched to come and throw all the weird things at him, Skyler Knight without a doubt did not look forward to actually bumping into his real uncle. Add the fact that his uncle was now seeing him traveling with aliens only added wood to the fire.

So far, he had only explained what he could to his uncle about how he met the mech. Even then, it wasn't enough to cool down the atmosphere. Uncle Robert continued staring at the mech, warily still pointing a gun, Sunstreaker did not back down from his glare, and Flipluck remained twitching and twittering confusedly behind one of the mech's protective double blades.

The young con man winced as he looked helplessly at both sides. "Can we compromise somehow?"

Sunny first broke the silence. "How about weapons down first?"

"I think I'm not in the position to do that," Robert suggested on the situation since he was clearly outmatched by size.

Sunstreaker scowled and growled.

Before the mech replied, Skyler cut in and pleaded, "Uncle Robert- Please- Flipluck's only a toddler according to their race."

His uncle caught his earnest gaze, worried eyes asking whether he was sane or not concerned about his own uncle's safety.

In turn, the youth gave him a stern look. "I consider him as a brother in arms. He's family. I trust Sunstreaker with my life."

Hearing this and contemplating on the fact that the large robot alien did protect his nephew from his own attacks, Robert lowered his aim and threw away the gun to the other side of the room, out of reach but still in sight. "I'm unarmed now. I **_am_** going to have answers for my questions." The agent kept his gaze fairly on the bot in front of him.

Skyler for one, noticed that his uncle had gone into full 'FBI-bad-cop mode'… which equaled to _obsessive_ paranoia.

_Damn it, with Uncle Robert like this he's not going to stop at anything until he knows everything._

Deep in his heart, the youth was praying desperately that the mech had a good deal of patience till it was over.

Complying, Sunstreaker sheathed his blades and slightly relaxed as he let out Flipluck from his enclosed protection, yet still kept an optic on the sparkling as the little mech scurried to the elder human in curiosity. He wasn't going to let this human do anything funny, whether he was Skyler's uncle or not. However the tone that the man was addressing him with seemed more of a concerned parent than an interrogator. Perhaps in a sense of feelings the human was judging him on why he was considered a brother in arms by his nephew and family. Skyler's increasing heartbeat was not missed by Sunny; it clearly indicated that he was in tons of trouble, which in normal circumstances the mech could laugh at. Yet, with his uncle like this Sunstreaker wasn't stupid enough to test the human's patience limit; if he said something stupid most likely there was a chance of losing Skyler as his guide to Nevada altogether.

In the mind of a small sparkling of course, there was a large overwhelming curiosity about this 'Uncle' Robert that Skyler knew. Seeing as nobody explained anything about what an 'uncle' was to him (due to the tense atmosphere), Flipluck did his own search through his datatrax on one of his language databases. What he came up with was 1) a brother of one's father or mother 2) the husband of one's aunt and 3) a term of address sometimes used by children for a male friend of their parents.

Sooner than one could think, Flipluck was sure it wasn't number three as from what he was looking at, this 'uncle' of Skyler's looked like Skyler facial-wise. He was no doubt taller, but had the same hair color even if it wasn't spiky, though his eyes were different than his nephew's. Uncle Robert was family.

To the sparkling, family equaled to safety.

Flipluck walked over slowly to Uncle Robert as he knew the larger human was nervous of him. Once he was close enough and hovering around his feet, the sparkling thought of trying to 'connect' with this family member of his caretaker. The only thing that the small mech could think of was what Skyler taught him.

He took the human's hand and opened it as both metallic and flesh were touching. With a smile, he chirped, "Bond!"

Robert was startled. It was true on how the small bot reacted like a normal hyperactive human child, but he did not expect the small sparkling to know something that was taught as a tradition in the Caldwell family, or at least what a member of the 'family' knew of. He looked towards his nephew and received a nod that he was responsible for teaching the small alien. Nevertheless he was still reluctant on trusting the larger alien; there were many questions he wanted to ask.

Seeing the elder human distracted with his own thoughts, the sparkling's eyes twinkled mischievously.

_Now!_

The sparkling jumped up high and landed on the chest of Skyler's uncle knocking the air out of him.

**   
_CRASH!_   
**

Sunstreaker immediately with his fingers picked up Flipluck away from the fallen human and scolded him in Cybertronian. Skyler of course went to his uncle apologizing for the small mech's behavior. Robert for one was slightly a bit shocked though he wasn't angry and nodded to his nephew with a shrug.

"But Sun! I had to try it out!" Flipluck whined.

"It doesn't mean you can jump up on random people, runt!" Sunny snorted still holding Flipluck in the air. "What in Primus _were_ you trying to _do _anyway?" He wasn't exactly all that thrilled about Flipluck's mishap since it could ruin his only chance of being on Skyler's uncle's good side.

"A Fwomp!" the sparkling said with his arms wide open and giggled, satisfied he had managed to do an immense feat.

"Huh? A Fwomp?" Sunny asked skeptically, certain that the word did not compute in the formal and slang language data. He looked to Skyler and his uncle for answers.

"Never heard of it," the elder Caldwell said, still keeping a straight face although getting hug-tackled down by a toddler was embarrassing in a way.

Skyler, on the other hand, asked the smaller mech, "Flipluck? What does it mean?"

"A Flop + Glomp = Fwomp!" he chirped happily.

The other three occupants of the room twitched and couldn't help but feel awkward as they faced the sparkling.

Robert soon cleared his throat. "I think someone owes me an explanation."

Before Skyler could do anything, Sunstreaker put down the smaller mech next to Skyler, changed to his alt-form, and opened his door, "If you want answers, human, we'll discuss them."

"Sunstreaker-"

"I can handle this," Sunstreaker cut in. "Take the runt, keep him distracted, and I'll talk to your uncle."

Seeing as the alien wanted to talk to him personally, Robert put a hand up before his nephew complained. "I'll talk to you after."

Skyler sighed, "… Fine." He was very reluctant in leaving the both of them together. _Might as well give them both warnings of each other. _The youth understood that they were going to speak of things that weren't meant for Flipluck's audio receptors, but better safe than sorry. "On one condition."

Robert looked to Skyler with curiosity.

"Try not to kill each other," the young con man said and before both of them said a word he stressed, "Sunstreaker, you have a really heated temper, alright? Cool down a little; my uncle has a bad habit of pressing someone till they spill out information. It comes with his work, so don't even _think _of squishing my uncle. He's family and my official guardian even though I am legally an adult."

He then turned towards his uncle. "Uncle Robert, try not to be overly paranoid. I'm really sorry I never told you about this going on, but Steve's life is at stake here. I made my own decision in coming along with Sunstreaker, and I hope you'll eventually somehow understand why I made it even though you may not like it." Skyler also added, "Same goes for you, don't hurt Sunstreaker from the interior. I'd know that you can do real damage to someone if you put your mind to it."

With a final breath, Skyler said, "Are we clear on this situation?"

A grunt and a simple yes were heard from both Sunstreaker and his uncle.

Without another word, Skyler lifted the sparkling into his arms and carried him away from the garage as his uncle sat inside the interior of Sunstreaker and closed the door.

Rather than think of anything to do with the mech and his uncle strangling (non-literally) at each other's throat for information of each other, Skyler focused on having a quiet lunch and giving Flipluck his new spiral-bound sketchbook, sketch pencils and new color pencils. The small mech was so happy that he was doing flips and cartwheels everywhere. The youth only laughed amusedly as he explained that the sparkling could use it as a sketch journal so that Flipluck should sketch the things he liked seeing on a particular day or something that was going on. On another note there was still something bugging his mind…

"Flipluck?"

"Yes, Sky?"

"Where did you learn to sneak up and grab my uncle when I was pinned down to the floor?" the sparkling's caretaker asked.

Flipluck paused to think and chirped, "From watching a Pokemon movie! Sun didn't like Barney, so he switched channels to Cartoon Network!"

Skyler scratched his head, wondering how he was going to teach Flipluck that something on TV didn't always set good examples for happened in real life. _Aww, nuts._ No wonder Flipluck was sketching what seemed to be him playing with the resident main Pokemon character, Pikachu. At least the franchise was set to teach good morals, and even if the stunts done by the characters were enough to get them killed they were always somehow in the end unscathed with few bruises or cuts whatsoever. Sunstreaker's reason for switching to Cartoon Network was a valid explanation, since Skyler wasn't exactly fond of the purple dinosaur show either.

Then there was a sound of a few cluttered clicks from the sparkling. Knowing this was the way he acted when something was bothering Flipluck, Skyler tapped the sparkling's head, "What's wrong, Flipluck? Spill, I know you're bothered about something."

"Hmm…" the sparkling sighed. "…What's it like to play with other sparklings?"

Skyler didn't understand at first, but soon realized what he meant. "You mean playing with other children? It's supposed to be fun, I guess. Why?"

"…Never played with others. Want to know what it's like. Ash and Pikachu looked really happy when they played with their friends."

The youth was effected by the sparkling's words; it was true he actually never ever had played with someone who was his age. Skyler was sure that White Eagle was wary of letting the small mech in view of con artists and the fact he was not human and traveling with Skyler who was soon going to be hunted down didn't help matters.

"I don't know, little mech," The con man sighed. "We'll see, Flipluck. We'll see."

* * *

Sunstreaker was more than glad to take Skyler's warnings into consideration and with a serious approach. His human partner was not kidding at all on how paranoid his Uncle was. It was like facing a blend of Prowl's blunt facts, with Ironhide's tendency to scare his opponent or practically anyone with his weapons, and add in a touch of Red Alert's paranoia. Robert Knight or 'Caldwell' to Sunstreaker's optics screamed danger at the highest level when it came to digging up Intel with torture methods. Without a doubt his FBI status had meant nothing compared to his real occupation as a Con man.

_No wonder Skyler said he was a legend._

Sunstreaker was actually really _thinking_ before answering this human.

While nearly most of the time his tone seemed light-hearted or even carefree, his words were extremely persuasive. It felt like being a remote control and being pressed on to see if he reacted or not. To Robert it was a game of words, emotions, and vanity. Thankfully, he'd seen this trick before when Skyler was on his regular short cons. The human inside his interior currently played it on a higher and more sophisticated level than Skyler. Nonetheless it wasn't exactly easy to endure for a hot tempered bot like Sunny.

Seeing as most of the main questions of what he was, where he came from, and what was his intent on this planet as well as why his kind was on Earth were out of the way, he made it clear to Skyler's uncle that by no circumstances he would hurt his nephew and he was entitled to be his protector as Sunny needed a guide since his communication systems were dead. There was an argument on how Steve came into all of this, but after Sunstreaker explained that their meeting was indeed considered lucky and if Sunstreaker had not shown up (even if he did kidnap Skyler) things could have turned out far worse. One situation or scenario Sunny explained showed that if Sunstreaker and Skyler had not met, his nephew could have been in the hands of Soundwave with no chance of a rescue because the government would have no idea who they were.

With that explanation the human was silent.

Robert Knight was fighting an internal argument with himself.

One part of him did not want this alien to be anywhere near his nephew, not after he had lost both his brother and sister-in-law as well as his niece. In a sense, his paternal instincts were taking over as the pain of loss still left mental scars on him. Yes, Robert was aware that his nephew was an adult and that he had to make his own choices, but to fully agree that he was voluntarily entering a manhunt with a bounty on his head and much less a intergalactic war of gigantic robots? It was a hard fact to swallow, even if Robert had seen a lot of things during his life as both and FBI agent and Con man. He was even sure that Danny and Rusty would agree it was ridiculous.

The other part however, was telling himself to let his nephew go with his decision. If it was true on what Sunstreaker had said, then maybe it was the way things should have happened. If things hadn't, he would have not met with his nephew right now or worse he would have been at both of his nephews' funeral. Another factor was this large robotic organism traveling with Skyler. He had been prodding on the mech's emotions to see what kind of person he was. Yes, the mech did have an ego to boot, not really a surprise as he was a warrior. However, on the inside Robert was seeing how protective Sunstreaker was of Skyler. Not just because he needed Skyler as a guide to get to his kind, but more on the level he trusted his nephew with his life and even considered Skyler family.

_Family, huh?_ Unlike his brother's view, which was pretty much the same as how he himself viewed it (the con man way), Skyler's view of family also came from his mother Tiffany. _To think he would even teach such a thing to an alien robotic child._ His brother was always bragging about how his wife was best at it to the point that everyone in the Caldwell family adopted it and even Danny's group as well. At least a major part of him accepted that the mech was indeed 'family'. The only thing that held him back was the fact he was afraid that if both the twins died before he did, Robert was scared to lose the last remaining connection to his youngest brother.

Seeing the human was fighting inner turmoil, Sunstreaker only stated, "Just because we do the things we do or need to do, it doesn't mean you need to do things alone or be alone. We're in it together; share the pain when you need to. You don't have to bear it alone." A snort. "I think Skyler said that before."

Robert blinked with surprise. "What?"

Sunstreaker sighed. "Frag it, human. Your stress levels are rising so fast I do not really believe my scanners. If you're worried about things and can't spill it in front of me, why don't you talk to Skyler?" Another sigh. "I'm fine with the fact you have no intentions of trusting me, I'll live. But if there's anyone that deserves the truth on why you don't approve, then it's your own nephew."

"Are you lecturing me?" Robert said in serious tone.

A sarcastic laugh. "Oh, no, _Robert_. Those were Skyler's words; your nephew is the real one that's lectured the _both_ of us." The tone of his voice was like he was smirking despite he was in his alt-mode, "Unless you're afraid of admitting it." Seeing the changes of the human's body that showed he was on the defensive he couldn't believe that doing a con himself was…_fun._

The elder con man was stunned.

It was a punch in the gut.

The alien was right; he never expected that his fear was actually clouding his view. Which by all means an alien robot had to point it out to him. Finding the courage and keeping himself in control, he leaned on the car seat and asked, "Then, can I entrust you with my fear?"

Sunstreaker was shocked at first, but realized that this human was deciding to trust him. Naturally he answered by quoting his human partner, "I'm here with an open mind."

And with that, Robert explained on his fear of losing his only connection that to him was his brother. The elder con man was aware Skyler was not his son, but he did not want to lose both of his nephews who were ironically in trouble for the very same reason he'd lost Taylor, Tiffany and his niece Scarlet in Mission City. He was confused as he knew he had a chance in stopping it altogether, but was uncertain of having Skyler spend the rest of his life running away. Or he could let Skyler go, which meant he faced the knowledge his nephew had a large chance to die the same way his parents and sister had.

The warrior mech now understood what Robert had meant. Thanks to Skyler's conversation that morning, he did.

"You're afraid to lose your brother's bond?" Sunstreaker scoffed. "Seriously, I thought humans were more resilient than that. Looks like Skyler beat you by mile on this one."

Skyler's uncle was angry at the bot but Sunny ignored it. He was still silent.

Sunstreaker knew all too well that a seething con man wasn't good. They had a tendency to go for the 1001 ways to get revenge. He then said, "Trust me, human, a Cybertronian bond is much more physical than your human bonds. Once it breaks by force, it's like losing an organ to you organics." He did live through one, but that was beside the point. To give the man some credit he commented, "Skyler knows you care for him, he respects you for that, and I doubt he would want to worry you or think about dying early. He didn't teach Flipluck about human bonds for nothing. If I am correct, then your brother does exist within you whether Skyler's there or not."

There was a weak laughter from the elder con man. "To think I've missed a small detail like that, how embarrassing."

"It's what you humans term as 'freaking out'," Sunny shrugged. "You understand now what I mean when we're both lectured by your nephew?"

"Quite frankly, yes," Robert nodded. Perhaps they were more similar than he could have ever thought. "I think I'm going to have a good talk with him."

"I guess that finalizes everything."

"It seems we're reached an agreement," Robert motioned.

"Hmm."

They both knew the conversation was finally over. Sunstreaker unlocked the door and let the human out.

"A word of advice, human: acceptance is what makes imperfections perfect."

"Wise words from an alien," the human said as he walked towards the exit. "I'll take that advice."

"I'm a lot older than you think I am," Sunny said as a matter-of-fact and at the same time his fondness for Skyler's uncle grew.

"Sunstreaker?" Robert asked as he turned, facing the mech just before he exited the garage.

"Yes?"

The elder smirked. "Welcome to the family."

The bot only chuckled. "Glad to be welcomed. No hard feelings?"

Robert rolled his eyes. "You're in a Con family, Sunstreaker. We're bound to blackmail each other very soon. No promises."

"Touché," Sunny agreed and smirked inwardly. He wasn't going to lose.

* * *

When Robert came into the house, Skyler was typing away on his laptop in the kitchen. He briefly passed the living room to see the small sparkling sleeping on the couch covered with a blanket. Seeing it was a good opportunity to approach his nephew, he sat in the seat just opposite Skyler and gazed at him to indicate that he was going to have 'the talk'.

Typing in the last batch of codes, Skyler saved his work and put aside the laptop, taking in what was going to come.

"You, young man, are in serious trouble…" the 'parent' tone was used.

Skyler tensed. _SHIT! SHIT! SHIT!_

"Skyler Ethan Caldwell…"

The youth shuddered. _Crap, full family name tone as well._

_He was not going to survive this…_

"You have my permission to do what you wish."

There was a ten long second silence.

He gaped.

If his mouth didn't have a bone, his jaw would have literally crashed down to the floor.

"Close your mouth Skyler, unless you want to swallow a fly," his uncle reminded.

Skyler did so, but he immediately asked, "Uncle Robert, are you _serious_?"

"Serious enough to let you go so that you can find Steve, Skyler," Robert sighed. "I did a lot of thinking on my part for this. Although you should thank your alien brother in arms as well as your own actions that I trust you."

"My actions?" Skyler frowned. His eyes went wide. "You know what I've been doing."

His uncle laughed, "Of course I do. I'm your uncle and I'm a con man. There were only some things that didn't make sense, but with Sunstreaker's explanation it's all clear now."

"How much do you know?" his nephew asked curiously.

"Enough to say I'm proud of you in making it to 3rd place in a con family gathering for poker, your success in a few small heists, and as well as sticking around to help out family even if you actually were trying to kill a Decepticon."

With all of those words coming out, Skyler reluctantly blushed. He rarely saw his uncle nowadays, much less received a real compliment.

He then continued, "Other than that, you still need to work on your Aikido."

"Well, I'm guilty for that one," Skyler admitted. "I don't have the highest rank yet for that like you do." A pause. "You're really letting me go now?"

Robert looked to his nephew with discontent but nodded anyway. "You said I will eventually accept your decision; I am. This is something that you'll have to finish with Steve, especially now that the situation is much more complex than I'd like it to be. Perhaps it's better you keep a low profile like you planned, the situation isn't all well either."

"I have a feeling you know more details than I do," the youth said analyzing his uncle's statement. "I've been wondering how you found me here in the first place. So, what's the story behind all of this?"

The elder con man smiled. "It seems Franz was right, your knack for noting details is sharper." He breathed out, "I was here on a crime job, but once I checked it was taken care of I reported to headquarters that I was going to do some research on a side job."

"A side job?" Skyler frowned. It seemed that Uncle Robert knew about his brief visit in Memphis, so Uncle Franz and Uncle Neil had contacted him somehow.

A pause. "Yes, you're probably aware that when the FBI has a side job it has to do something with the other organizations such as the NSA and the CIA. In other words, the FBI works as an Intel extension for the government."

"They're looking for me."

"Undeniably," Robert said in a hushed tone, "or both the hackers that were said to have blocked the unknown breach that threatened to take one of our military sub-division Intel, the Furta duo."

Skyler didn't say anything as he waited for his Uncle.

"Can you imagine how I felt when I found out from your alien friend that both of my nephews were behind it?" Robert said with a sarcastic laugh. "But I'm not going to hunt you down or capture you as now I'm seeing the bigger picture; I might as well help you out with what limited knowledge I have."

The youth nodded appreciatively, "Thanks, Uncle Robert. So, how did you find me?"

This time his uncle shrugged. "As you've probably guessed, I didn't know you were here. I was searching around the neighborhood to see people who were temporary residents, and planned on doing some scouting while the house was empty when you were off to work."

Skyler chuckled, "Yeah. Only you didn't expect me to come sooner since my boss let me off for the day, so the house wasn't exactly empty."

Robert scowled, "Well, trust my nephew to have aliens guarding his house." He returned to the main topic. "They don't know who the Furta duo really are, but the fact they've already started searching since it was an order from the Pentagon is enough for me to have suspicions. They never mentioned what the military sub-division was, so it was a rather lost cause. But as you know Steve is with them right now, it's only a matter of time your face will show up on the bounty list."

"They want my head?" Skyler asked sarcastically. "Never knew that. More importantly, how long will it take to happen once the word spreads?"

"A day, two or at most three days, considering your situation," Robert said. "Seeing as this has to do with the secret military thing the FBI is notified but as you know they'll keep it a secret from the public. Different from Sam Witwicky's public manhunt, and it'll take longer to locate you, especially if you keep moving."

"Thanks for the heads up."

"You're my nephew, Skyler," Robert stood. "On the other hand, I heard from Sunstreaker that you were having trouble with finding out about what drove Soundwave away from your hacker war."

Skyler scratched his head. "Yeah, I'm working on the why factor. All I know is the coding I developed worked. I'm working on updating the _Lazaros _so it could beef up the effect, or perhaps if it is good enough it'll permanently be a firewall that specifically keeps Soundwave away."

His uncle blinked, "You made the _Lazaros?_" Like learning his nephews were the Furta duo isn't enough, he was now hearing that his nephew was the creator of the mysterious server floating around the World Wide Web that was rumored to be 'alive' and had copied and replicated nearly all types of codes that were traveling through the Net. Many of the FBI agents on the Intel division were suspecting it was a myth while the CIA seemed to be adamant about its existence.

"Actually, Steve was the one who made it," Skyler corrected, smiling weakly at his Uncle's shock. "Sorry for another shock, but to sum it up simply my codes are the base for the _Lazaros._ You could say we thought it was safer if we made the whole system parted in two ways. Steve was in charge of the server system and me for the base encoding."

"How on earth did you two make such a thing?" Robert scowled.

Skyler shrugged, "We were both bored, and it started off as a side high school project kind of thing. Uncle Nagel sort of supported us in making something that could help us with future heists involving hacking, so we worked on it whenever we weren't busy."

Robert knew just how frightening Skyler was going to be when he became a full fledged con artist, but he couldn't help but smile about his nephew's accomplishments. As a side note, he was going to send a thank you message to Roman Nagel for making his nephews into what they were now. The British hacker and tech-freak extraordinaire wasn't chosen by Danny and Rusty to join their group for nothing.

"Alright, let's see the recording on this hacker war you did."

The youth nodded as he put the laptop between them so his uncle could see and as well know how it happened. Skyler explained the best he could on how the long 10 minutes of the hacker war were peculiar, as in the beginning Soundwave was not effected at all but toward the end it was as if he was struggling to stay connected before getting rejected by the codes. His uncle seemed to agree on the fact that it wasn't a coincidence and suggested Skyler should ask for help.

"Help?" the younger con man questioned. "I would ask our Guru if he wasn't so busy with Uncle Danny's heist."

"Actually, you're in luck," Robert answered. "Nagel's in Salt Lake City, Utah. Apparently Rusty didn't want our Intel too close to the capital, so the base is there. He's sticking around for another two months last time I heard."

Relief showed on Skyler's face. "That is good news. Finally something worth looking into. I only had plans to go to Denver and meet up with Keith's group and Rachel. I'll make the trip there then."

"I suppose I won't have to worry how you'll get there, seeing as you have an alien brother now who can keep you out of the radar," Robert chuckled.

Skyler smiled, understanding from those words that his uncle had accepted the mech as family, "I suppose your conversation with Sunstreaker went well?"

"I had my suspicions, but that's been resolved," his uncle replied. "You've got yourself a good ally to go through this." He didn't comment on the smaller mech, but he knew it was his nephew's business even if they were taking a child with them into the fray.

"Yeah."

**'BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!'**

Both heads shot up and turned to the laptop that kept on beeping until Skyler opened up a window that showed the alert.

"What's the alert for?" Robert questioned.

A quick reply. "It's for detecting any sort of activity in the hacker forums, although I set it to a high frequency as in there will be a trending topics that keep people talking."

As they both scrolled through various sites, one site showed an unusual amount of views and posts. Looking to the first post that the person was raving about, Skyler clicked it.

Robert only scanned its content and said, "It's the one alright."

 

**NEST Intel Shall Fall.**

**Infiltration Into NEST Will Commence Tomorrow 12:00:00 PDT.**

**HACKERS BEWARE, SHOULD YOU INTERFERE I WILL HUNT YOU DOWN.**

**~ SonitusUnda ~**

**   
**

Skyler looked at the message with sheer dread. "Crap."

"There's no turning back now, Skyler," Robert said to his nephew. He put his hand on his nephew's shoulder with a reassuring squeeze. "…Careful."

"…Yeah, I know," the youth sighed. "I'll get all the gear ready to record and programs set up. I'm going to tell Sunstreaker about this."

Soundwave was going to make his move.

_The war of coded minds was about to start._

__

* * *

 

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 3.02: Soundwave makes His Move._

_City of Oakley_   
_, Kansas, US_   
_._

_Who would have thought that a simple stop at some fleshling town that wasn't really a bustling city at all was going to attract some unwanted things from happening?_

_I certainly didn't._

_Or maybe my human partner has some sort of invisible magnet in him that ALWAYS ATTRACTS these kinds of things._

_Primus!_

_As if a sparkling wasn't enough for me…_

_It turns out that the one sneaking around Skyler's house who I thought was an imposter was Skyler's REAL uncle. I can't really believe how many times things just get out of hand, but there you go! More weird stuff happening! I think when this crazy journey ends I won't be surprised if I've rolled my optics over ten thousand times by the end of it. Well…bring on the weird bits and pieces! As long as it isn't fatal, I might as well not complain anymore. Heh._

_Great, now I'm starting to sound like Red Alert._

_I hope I'm exempted from his paranoid glitches._

_Speaking of paranoia glitches, I was actually surprised at how Skyler's uncle had a habit of being very specific when it came to questioning. In a way it was like Prowl but with manners that were identical to Ironhide. He knew where to execute it and when it had its best effect on someone else. No surprise, though. His line of work was an FBI agent, as well as a Con man, and his experience and expertise was on a higher level than Skyler. I'm glad Skyler warned me first, if not, I would have burned a fuse during his long period of questioning._

_Paranoid? Definitely._

_It was weird how Flipluck seemed to take a liking towards Robert once he knew that the person was Skyler's uncle._

_He was just as stubborn as Skyler is, but after all of the explanations, thankfully he seemed to understand the situation we were in. I was actually glad he accepted me even if I was sure that at first he wouldn't trust me at all. Not to mention I was welcomed into Skyler's con family. Bizarre, I know; yet he's better off being an ally than an enemy. I think I'm going to like Skyler's dangerous like-kind family; it works well with a warrior mech like me._

_The fact that he mentioned blackmailing wasn't really at all good news._

_I might as well give up on hiding that fact from the runt as his 'family' aren't good role models but he might learn something morally useful as long as Skyler is around._

_Just when I'm still trying to get some rest and peace and quiet in came Skyler to tell the dreadful news._

_Soundwave was going to attack the Intel servers tomorrow._

_I suppose a moment of peace passes by too quickly._

_Tch. Son of a glitch._

_~ Sunny_

__

* * *

 

**TBC…**

 


	13. (PART I): The Hacker War Gamble, It All Comes to Slaggin' Luck

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies again the format may screw up due to the central alignment of the site is not working. Thanks for understanding.
> 
> Enjoy this new update!

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 13 (PART I): The Hacker War Gamble, It All Comes to Slaggin' Luck ~**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 3.03: When Gambling Gets Rough_

_City of Oakley__, Kansas, US__._

_If there's a gamble that con man doesn't like, it's a gamble of certain loss._

_Yup, we HATE losing._

_Not losing in the sense that we fought a battle that was hard and barely managed to get a dent in an enemy; I'm saying a battle that you couldn't get into because you knew the consequences and it was a really a bad time to actually come in the first place. Or much worse, a battle you want to help with, but you are not allowed to be in one because for some reason you ended up becoming a 'vital point' of something._

_It was like doing a 'Harry Potter'._

_UGH._

_And I don't even like the series._

_Only for me it was: The-Hacker-Who-Disappeared._

_And pretty much, Uncle Robert was doing a 'Dumbledore'; he wants to keep me gone from the radar._

_As to how I know the characters and everything, just say Scarlet dragged me to the cinema to watch it years ago because my parents were out and Steve was sick in bed._

_My opinion?_

_It f****** SUCKED!_

_That was pretty much how I feel right now._

_So yesterday afternoon, evening, and even to the night we prepared to record the hack that was going to happen the next day with all the right tools ready. The three of us (my uncle, Sunstreaker, and I), made an agreement that we were NOT allowed to interfere with what Soundwave was doing. We were pretty much going to watch and record while this hack happened, as it was all for the sake of getting the sample that could in turn be made into a weapon to go against the 'Con Intel officer._

_Watching and not doing anything at all really goes against my nature, but there's wasn't anything I could do as I was certain I was going to give the authorities and the Decepticons a lead if I interfered with the hacker war._

_Since the hacker war was going to take place at 12:00:00 pm PDT, it would take place at 2:00:00 pm CDT which was the Kansas local time (with an exception of four other counties). This meant we had a lot more time than we thought initially, so preparation wasn't so hectic. Laptop on, seeing the connection works well, and because the next day was the weekend I wasn't going to be working._

_Uncle Robert had returned to his motel room that night, he said he was going to contact his superiors and so forth, as well as the FBI Intel division about the hacker war. Sunstreaker on the other hand had taught me more on Cybertronian encryption as well as how it was used in human encoding. As for Flipluck, he seemed to be moody that night as we were busy preparing to record the hack; I was rather worried about him as he seemed to be restless because he didn't have someone to play with him like usual. With the hacker war going on, very soon I was already having problems in taking care of Flipluck. Once when we're on the chase, I knew there would be no more time for games._

_At one single notice things are going on the down low._

_I hoped the Autobots could handle Soundwave._

_If not, the US Military and the Department of Defense were pretty much doomed for._

_~ Sky_

* * *

Morning had finally come.

Skyler Knight sipped his hot chocolate from his mug relishing the feel of calmness as the warm liquid went through his throat and stomach. He didn't feel anything but calm that morning, but having his nerves in check was better than panicking like a raving lunatic. Plus, he was a con man, and he knew that in situations like this, he needed to keep his cool.

Hearing excited clicks, a grumble, and his uncle's chuckle, Skyler turned from the view of the espresso machine he was currently attending to and looked at what was going on in the garage. Even though the workstation was already full with Steve's and his laptop along with other various devices, most of the occupants of the house were in the middle of the room. Oddly enough his uncle, Robert, was teaching Flipluck what the youth predicted was one of those street magic tricks. Sunstreaker was muttering incoherently under his breath at how he kept on guessing the cards wrong when his uncle told his to make a guess. As for the sparkling, it was very clear he found a new idol in Uncle Robert as his optics were shining and twinkling a bright baby blue.

Yes, Skyler well aware that White Eagle was responsible for how Flipluck was an expert at card shuffling (besides the fact he had an alt-form as one), but the fact that the small bundle of wires was soon to be taught bar bets, short hands, and even con card tricks was slightly disturbing. The younger con man knew Sunstreaker didn't like it; but he'll probably let it slide somehow for now. However, Skyler couldn't help but thinking about the reactions of the other Autobots later on. He shook his head. _Consequences be damned_. Skyler smiled as the smaller mech was in extremely high spirits to learn something new, and his uncle was happily being the sparkling's mentor. In a way, it reminded Skyler about how he was no different to the sparkling all those years ago.

Then, the doorbell rang.

Robert frowned as he looked to his nephew, "Were you expecting someone this morning?"

Skyler shook his head, "No. I'm pretty sure I didn't make any arrangements or any meetings for today." It was a holiday after all. "I'll check it out. Can you-"

"Don't worry, we'll keep things quiet here while you're answering the door," Robert reassured his nephew. The house was supposed to be empty; at least according to the locals that Skyler was a lone traveler.

Sunstreaker added in, "It's better to answer the door before whoever it is makes any idiotic suspicions and decides to investigate."

Robert gave an intense glare to the mech, "_Who_ are you referring to?"

A tone of false innocence came out from the mech, "I'm not referring to anyone, human. I'm just pointing out it could happen _again_."

Skyler raised an amused brow at this because since this morning, both the mech and his uncle were really getting into the 'Con Family Spirit'… of blackmailing each other. Seeing that it was safer not to put his foot where it shouldn't be, the youth excused himself since he needed to get to the door and answer whoever it was.

When he got to the door, he cautiously peered into the door hole to see who the stranger was. There was a man with his blond hair combed back, he seemed rather pale, like he hadn't sleeping for days, but by the expression of his face he was anxious. By Skyler's memory, he had no clue as to who the stranger was, by any chance, he never saw him during his stay and work time in Oakley. Adding the fact he wasn't wearing any sort of uniform dismissed the fact he was here for a delivery service.

The con man opened the door slowly and carefully and asked politely, "Good morning, may I help you?"

"G-good morning, uh- Um… Would you- Would you happen to be Skyler Knight by any chance?" the man asked nervously.

Inwardly Skyler was on immediate guard although on the outside he only showed the man a disinterested frown, "Yeah, I'm him. And you are?"

"Thank goodness!" the man sighed with relief. If anything, Skyler was sure he was trying not to cry as his eyes were glazed with water. "I- I'm- I'm Jake Stephan."

Before Skyler could say anything or react, he was shocked to receive a crashing hug by the other man.

"Woah! Woah! Woah! Hold – Hold it! Um… Stephan?" the youth said confusedly at first.

Jake let go and took a step back but there was a smile and respect in his eyes, "I'm Tiffany's father. Thank you so much for helping to save my daughter's life! I'm indebted to you."

The youth however raised the question, "How did you know that I was the donator?"

"The jar," Jake said as he took out the very same jar Skyler used from his side bag as proof. "Tiffany had specifically put her favorite design with Mrs. Nathan at the craft shop. I asked Mrs. Nathan who took the jar at her shop."

Skyler was annoyed that his plans to keep it anonymous had failed, but he smiled at Mr. Stephan. "I'm glad I managed to help out, Mr. Stephan." Yet, the conversation didn't end there as Jake put a hand on the youth's shoulder.

"Skyler, if it is okay with you… can you meet my daughter Tiffany?"

No doubt, the con man was shocked at this at the point he was silent.

"She wishes to meet you. Tiffany said she wants to thank you for helping her."

"I- E-Er… ," Skyler stuttered. He wasn't sure about this, but thinking that maybe it was wise to at least be polite he asked, "When can I meet her? I don't want to bother her when-"

"No, no, no. It's fine," Jake assured. "She's been awake since this morning but she's gotten plenty of rest. She's really eager to meet you, and if you're wondering about transport- I- I'll drive." He made a gesture to his own car that was ready to go.

Thinking that this meeting wouldn't take too long and he still had time till past noon, Skyler nodded, "Give me five minutes. I need to get ready and grab a few things."

"Of course! Thank you so much!" Jake exclaimed as he bowed. "Take your time."

It may have been impolite to leave the man at the front door and not invite his inside to sit down, but the youth didn't want him in the house and accidentally finding his uncle and his alien friends. He made it to the garage to find Flipluck, his uncle, and Sunstreaker stopping their whispered conversations and looking up to him for answers.

"Who was our uninvited guest?" Robert pressed; ever the paranoid one.

"Do you remember the sick girl I told you about and the donation I made for her last night?" Skyler implied. There was nod. "It was her dad."

"How did he find out?" his uncle asked again.

"The local gossiper blew my cover," his nephew replied dryly. The youth's face looked sour. "It just so happens to be that the gossiper is my current boss' wife."

Robert merely chuckled at his nephew's minor failure, "Best you work on your stealth for next time."

"Well, he wants me to see Tiffany now." Skyler said ignoring the failure his uncle clearly pointed out. "I'm taking a trip to the hospital, I'll be back soon."

"You'll be back for Soundwave's invasion to your government's servers?" Sunny cut in.

Skyler looked to the mech, "As much as I really _hate_ just watching and not doing anything, yeah, I'll be back before he starts. I promise."

Sunstreaker didn't seem to be bothered with that and his attention was back on the sparkling who was trying to figure out a card trick Robert gave him to solve. Flipluck was too occupied in solving how to do it, that he didn't seem to want to listen to the conversation they were having.

However before the youth got to the door, Robert stopped him. "Wait!"

"What?"

"I have a feeling you should take Flipluck with you," his uncle said.

There was a scoff from the mech, "Is your brain still working properly, Robert? Are you out of your slaggin' mind?"

In turn, even Skyler looked skeptically at his uncle, "Sunstreaker has a point. We do have safety issues, and you're more paranoid than I am. But why are you suggesting this? I know you're up to something, Uncle Robert."

Robert looked rather offended in the lack of faith the two were giving him, yet he answered, "No, I'm not out of my mind, Sunstreaker. As for why… I believe that the fact that this girl knew of Flipluck and even drew him despite the way he really isn't supposed to exist isn't a coincidence. Call it a gut feeling." He then gazed to his nephew and reminded lightly, "Other than that, he could use someone to play with who's nearer to his age."

The mech wasn't happy about this, "Slag it, Robert-"

"I know it is dangerous, Sunstreaker," the elder con man cut in. "But remember that perhaps this is Flipluck's _only_ chance to experience this before you all are being hunted down."

The two caretakers were silent and pondered this for a moment.

Skyler was shocked that his uncle was speaking like this. It wasn't like him at all. He only used the tone when it came to being protective of family, children. The younger con man was aware of just how fierce his uncle was when it came to making sure his children and even his nephew and nieces were having a real childhood. It was simply because his uncle, aunt, and dad never had a good one. They had to work hard and turned into what they were now because of the murder of his (Skyler's) grandfather. The last time he used that tone was when he was at Skyler's parent's and sister's funeral three years ago. Back then, his Uncle had vowed to take in both him and Steve into his family.

Sunny on the other hand was weighing his options. Suspiciously, he had his own sentiment that the elder con man was right. Why did this come up all of a sudden? Why did the girl draw Flipluck? Yet, the main mystery was why was this all connected? Yes, the mech wasn't exactly the true believer in the legends and so forth. However, he remembered how his leader Optimus Prime was someone that was a part of such a thing. Then why not Flipluck? The sparkling was still a big obscurity that kept making more questions. There were no clues on how he came to be and why he just showed up. If anything was to be done, it was to follow the intuition that Primus was giving them, and apparently, the girl was maybe the first step.

"You know Sunstreaker, Uncle Robert does have a good point," Skyler said finally making up his thoughts. "Flipluck asked me the question yesterday about what it was like to play with other children. It'll be a chance for him to interact with other humans too. "

The mech couldn't agree more with Skyler. However, Sunstreaker was convinced that there was another reason behind the fact Flipluck was going to play with a human youngling. "Just how long is he going to play with the youngling?"

"After our business with Soundwave's hack into the Intel severs is finished." Robert confirmed to the Cybertronian. "We're going to need all the focus on the task where the data is concerned. We only have one shot at this."

_Typical. _Sunny had predicted the deeper reason was going to be along those lines.

Without Flipluck around, they could focus on the task and Flipluck would not feel rejected as he was going to have someone to play with. He looked to the younger con man, "Skyler? Are you sure of this? I'm just worried about our secrecy, normal humans aren't supposed to know about my kind living on this planet. Having the family spreading the news of alien sightings here is going to blow our cover for both the 'Cons and the Autobots."

Skyler thought about this. "I'll do what it takes so the Stephan's keep it a secret. They do owe me, so I'll make it a bargaining chip if I have to. But if they are good hearted after I helped Tiffany, then I don't think they would spread it since this concerns their daughter's happiness."

"Reasonable," the mech said, "Just make you sure you check the humans first before you do anything. If it's too risky, then don't introduce the runt."

The youth nodded, "You can count on me."

"Since that's settled," Robert said as he looked to the sparkling, "Ready to meet and play with your new friend, Flipluck?"

The sparkling opposite him fidgeted nervously, "I can really play with a new friend?"

Sunny sighed, the sparkling was still shy as ever, but he needed to interact with others like the humans said so he'd be familiar in social situations. It wasn't like they'd be arriving at the Autobot's base very soon. "Go on, runt. You need it. You're going into alt-form first, be on your best behavior, and don't change to your bi-pedal mode unless Skyler gives you a signal."

The glow in the sparklings optics was now brighter, "So I can play? Meet new friend? Yeah! Okay! Okay! Okay! Will do what Sun says!" Flipluck was so thrilled with excitement that he twittered, clicked, and cluttered in Cybertronian. He then collapsed to his alt-form and Skyler lifted him up and put the small mech into a carrying bag with a can of oil as well as a few of the smaller mech's things.

"I'll be off then," Skyler said as he finished the preparations and giving a nod to his uncle and Sunstreaker.

Sunstreaker warned again, "Careful, I mean it." The tone was clear that the mech was trusting Skyler with the youngling although he was very reluctant since this was the first sparkling ever found since the destruction of the youth sector.

"I'll be extra cautious," Skyler swore. His uncle didn't say a word, but there was approval from his eyes. "See you guys in a few."

When he got to the front door with his bag, he was greeted by Jake. They both got into the car and headed towards the hospital. He told Skyler that his wife, Nicole, was at the hospital with his daughter. It was the weekend and the streets were mostly deserted than during weekday. Even so, Jake seemed to take his time to drive to the hospital, as he wanted to more know of who Skyler was. Skyler said a few things about himself and that he was traveling. There was one point Jake asked where he got the money from, which Skyler answered truthfully he got the winnings from a poker tournament. Jake no doubt gave an expression of great disbelief at first but Skyler showed a envelope that said '3rd Place Winner of the Annual Poker Tournament' from the casino with the official seal and the number sum of money, he immediately changed his mind.

"W-Wow," he gasped. "You're either a master or you were just extremely lucky." As he said what he really meant it earned a chuckle from the youth.

"I suppose it's a bit of both," Skyler shrugged knowing he did learn from a pro and he had lady luck on his side then. "Poker is a game of skill, but luck helps."

"So why Tiffany?" Jake asked. He then added, "I don't mean to be rude or anything- but- there's got to be a reason why you did it."

Skyler was debating whether to really tell the truth or not.

"You have the same eyes as me like before," the other man mentioned making the youth surprised.

"Huh? What do you mean?" The con man was rather skeptic of the other.

"Your eyes are telling me that Tiffany reminded you of someone," Jake said with a sad smile. "Like you're trying to save that person." Seeing Skyler was silent again, he shrugged. "Call it a feeling, but you seem to be trying to save someone you think might be out of your reach. You have the same face when I thought Tiffany was past saving."

A rare sad face came to Skyler's face as he sighed, "Tiffany… reminded me of my sister, Scarlet. It's kind of ironic that her favorite things are the same with my sister. She used to love playing the violin and talked me constantly into drawing fairies for her."

Jake took notice of the tone Skyler used, "Past tense. Is she-?"

"She died... along with my parents three years ago in Mission City," Skyler answered keeping his gaze to the window beside him.

The man in the driving seat was speechless. It wasn't until another three minutes or so he spoke.

"I'm sorry for your loss," Jake said in sympathy. "It must be hard."

"Yeah," another sigh came from the youth's lips. "Although, you're right about me trying to save someone though."

"Who?"

"My twin brother, he's the only one I have left. He went missing a month ago. I've been searching for him," Skyler answered. "I heard of some news coming up in Nevada, but it's still one large state to search for him."

"I'm sure you'll find him," Jake comforted. "I'll pray that you'll find him somehow."

A smile came to the youth, "Thank you."

Jake chuckled, "Actually – I'm the one that's supposed to be thanking you."

"Does anyone know I'm the donator besides you? Well – besides Tiffany and your wife maybe…" Skyler asked curiously leaving the last topic behind.

"No, I figured that you went into a lot of trouble in making yourself anonymous," the elder man shook his head with a hint of understanding. "I only asked and said I'd reply with a thank you letter for your donation to Mrs. Nathan like the other jars people have sent into the hospital. I did not tell her that you're the donator who that has given Tiffany a chance to live her life again."

"Glad to be of help," Skyler said. He then scratched his head as there was something he was meaning to ask, "I was wondering how the operation ended up costing two hundred grand? I know Tiffany has a rare disease but the operation costs wouldn't have been that high normally."

There was a bitter sigh from the other man, "The insurance company we have Tiffany under was – well – corrupted. They – _cheated_ us!"

Skyler had a feeling it was those situation where some greedy people were using insurance companies as a means to only collect money and make their clients as fools. America was a free country, but in some cases to any con man, it was clear how some exploited the people of the working class to no ends. Even by looking from lots of angles, people who were con artists or on their way as one, were here to stay. From Jake's view of course, Skyler had a feeling he'd seen this trick too many times. Thanks to people like Michael Moore, people knew of it, but even so it still didn't help when people become victims to something like it.

The youth read the situation carefully before he said, "They pulled the 'terms' trick on you, did they? Your daughter's disease wasn't covered in their terms, so when you asked them for the cover insurance you were fined double or triple the amount."

Jake looked angry but he then softened as he answered, "Y-Yes, it wasn't going well for us then. Even after I hired a lawyer, we still couldn't sue them for it. There wasn't any other way than paying them in full, but in turn the court would be monitoring the insurance company on the operation. If anything happens to Tiffany then the law will handle it. However at that time, there was no way we were going to get the money in time – Tiffany's life was a matter of six months…"

To any honest con man or even a con family, no doubt the company would've been a potential mark to be conned. There were just some bad people who were immune from the law because of money that you'd have to get people who could bend the law and use the laws back at them to step in. Still, the youth was insistent on getting to know the whole story first.

"So after you pay for this, they're not going to be charged for anything other than the operation?" Skyler asked.

"Yes, they will be." Jake lightened up at this. "We're lucky that Oakley's community for social service is a tight family, plus the court supports us. The company will be monitored for future cases because of Tiffany's case. If anything bad turns out, the company has to be shut down."

Skyler smiled at that, "Gotta say the law enforcement here are doing a good job here." It was rare that such a problem can be resolved, so the young con man decided that it was done.

"Thanks to you, Skyler," Jake supported. "I don't think the insurance company would be sued as they're supposed to until you helped us. Tiffany's not the only case they've done injustice to."

"You mean there's more?" Skyler ask incredulously.

Jake nodded solemnly, "Some weren't so lucky, they died before they could get their medication. I think a lot more people would like to thank you if they knew you were the one who helped out community."

The youth was uncomfortable, "It's okay, and they don't need to know. I prefer we keep it quiet."

"Alright, it's just between us then," Jake agreed seeing Skyler would rather keep himself anonymous. "I'm just saying what you did, really means a lot for the whole community."

Their conversation soon came to an end as they finally made it to the hospital. Jake happily provided Skyler a breakfast in the cafeteria while he talked to his wife and daughter. Nicole soon came to him with a crashing hug, and they both chatted at the cafeteria while Jake helped his daughter since she was going to take a bath. Tiffany's mother no doubt looked more like the girl he saw in the photos at the craft store, so her resemblance came from Nicole and not so much from Jake; it was the reason why Skyler couldn't recognize Jake at first.

Nicole as a mother was a true fighter no doubt, which reminded Skyler much like his own mom. The way she explained how they went into all the trouble and struggle to save their daughter as well as the other patients that have trouble from the same health insurance company was amazing. There were many organizations she helped as well as supported too. The youth was starting to see they were trustworthy, and considering that when people would come and go with congratulations or something to say was a sign they were known in the area. These people were real.

On the other hand, the youth kept an eye on the bag he had with him at his left on the other chair in the cafeteria.

Skyler made sure that Flipluck was all right every now and then. He wasn't exactly a real patient little mech, but seeing that he was going to meet his new friend soon, he was patient which was odd seeing him very still. In a way, it reminded the con man just how quiet and how the sparkling blended in the casino room as your everyday casino automatic card shuffler when Skyler first met him. Thankfully, it seemed that the 11-year-old girl he was supposed to meet was so excited to meet him that her 'bath' was quick and in no time, he was heading towards the hospital area where there were children with serious diseases. Her room was at the edge of the corridor.

Mrs. Stephan or Nicole knocked on the door and there was a surprisingly cheerful reply.

"Come in!"

As Skyler came in, he was greeted with a room that would usually be used for children with colorful wallpaper, but what caught his interest was the number of drawings that were drawn and glue tacked onto the wall. He had a feeling that the girl had been at the hospital for a long time, most likely over three months.

The youth waited near the door as Nicole greeted her daughter.

Tiffany looked like she was in the photo Skyler, a small girl with long brown hair with hazelnut eyes. The only difference that the con man noticed straight away was that she was very pale. While she looked to be able to do things normally, Skyler was very sure that she had been confined to her room and bed for a long time.

"Tiffany, this is Skyler," her mother said as she introduced the youth. "He's the one who helped you."

As soon the girl looked at him, she smiled widely. "I thought you were an old man."

Skyler perked at the statement, "Really?" _Well, that was awkward._ Not that it was unaccounted for; many people do have a belief that people who were better off were older.

A sigh came from her mom, "Tiffany, please be polite."

"Sorry, mom," she moaned. Tiffany than ushered Skyler to her bed, "Please, sit."

Placing the bag that had Flipluck in it, on the coffee table in the room, Skyler walked and sat on the side of her bed.

In an instant, Skyler was slightly shocked to be locked into a hug around him.

"Thank you so much for helping me! Thank you, Skyler!"

While at first Skyler was uncertain how to react to the hug, seeing the approving nods of both her parents he decided to hug her back gently. However, on the inside, he felt as if a pang was in his heart. It was like hugging Scarlet years ago.

Sensing his uneasiness as he stiffened quite suddenly, Tiffany pulled back from the hug, "Are you okay, Skyler?"

"Uh," the youth shuffled uneasily back, "It's just that I haven't hugged someone smaller than me in 3 years."

"Oh, okay. I hope it didn't bother you or anything."

"It's fine," Skyler nodded as he tried to keep his emotions in check. He looked around the room. "So, you like to draw?"

"Yeah," She brightened up, "I like drawing all sorts of things, but I like background paintings, fairies, and drawing robots the most." Tiffany pointed at one section of the wall, "Over there, are most of the stuff I draw for backgrounds and fairies for fantasy art." Then the girl pointed at the wall next to the windows, "Just a bit of everything over there," and lastly she pointed to the wall behind her bed, "and mostly robots here."

Skyler stood up as he looked around, because it was like a gallery, "These are actually good for someone your age. Although, if you could get yourself a private art teacher you might be doing real top art soon."

She blushed, "Really? You think so? What makes you think that?"

Before Skyler could think of an explanation, her father answered her, "Well, Tiffany. Skyler's a painter, I've heard from Mr. Nathan he paints cars and trucks but he's painted on canvas before. Am I right Skyler?"

Her eye widened in surprise as well with admiration, "Cool! So you can do all those cool paint jobs like they have on the 'Pimp My Ride' shows?"

The con man chuckled, "Yeah, that's pretty much my job." He then stopped at the pictures of robots. Some he recognized them to be from cartoons or anime, but his suspicions were now confirmed, as about half of the wall was indeed sketches of Flipluck. Curious to see what Mrs. Nathan had said Skyler decided to ask himself, "What's with this little guy? You seem to like to draw him a lot."

"Well…" She said unsurely. "I – um – I draw him. That's all."

Skyler wasn't happy with the answer yet he didn't show his discontent. He had other ways of getting answers without intimidating her. "It's okay; you can explain anything you want. It's part of an artist to express themselves or to draw a message to everyone else from what they draw," the youth pointed out.

Hearing the older boy than her said a good reason she decided to tell him what she knew.

"It's kind of sounds stupid, but – well – Since I was little, I kept on dreaming of him and playing with him one day." She said truthfully in a shy manner. "It's the best I can draw him like it. I still need to try better to make him look real."

"You're certain he's a guy?" Skyler asked another question.

"His voice is like a boy in my dream," Tiffany replied as she pointed to one of her pictures. "He's always playing with cards, and for some reason at times I see a lucky clover in the dream near him. You can see why I've used an art signature with a four leaf clover; but I think it has something to do with him."

As much as Skyler wanted to hide his expression right now, he just couldn't. There were far too many coincidences going on that Flipluck's meeting with this young girl just had to happen. _Heck, the four-leaf clover pointed out to Flipluck's name!_

"Are you well, son?" Jake asked. His wife seemed concerned too.

"Well, more of just really surprised than anything," Skyler breathed out with a smile. "I don't think this is a coincidence I suppose."

"What do you mean?" Nicole questioned.

"If it's alright, may I trust you all with a secret?" Skyler questioned back. "It's really important that you don't tell this to anyone."

Nicole looked up to her husband for approval. Jake of course was slightly skeptic of this, "What secret is this about?"

"The real reason why I helped Tiffany," the youth said.

Tiffany at that moment asked her dad, "May I know?"

"Is what you said in the car was true?" Mr. Stephans asked in a serious tone.

"It was true, but there was another reason why I wanted to help Tiffany," Skyler explained. "But I need your word you won't tell anyone."

Jake was uncertain at first but for a person who had lost so much, Skyler gave something that was precious to him which was his daughter's life. "Alright. You have my word."

"Dear?" his wife asked.

"Let's hear what Skyler has to say," Jake said as he circled his hand over Nicole's shoulder to comfort her. "He's helped us. I think he means well."

Mrs. Stephans nodded anxiously but trusted her soul mate, "I trust you, dear."

Seeing Tiffany had both her parents' permission she then said, "You can tell us, we swear we won't tell anyone. Promise!" She then asked, "So why did you help me?"

Skyler took breath, "You reminded me about my younger sister. Her name was Scarlet. She loved the violin and fairies. You play as well right?"

She nodded. "It's been a while; I haven't touched it since I'm not allowed to play here since it's noisy for the other patients." Tiffany did catch something wrong how Skyler said about his sister, "You said you 'loved' her. Did something happen to her?"

Skyler sighed as he took a seat on the chair next to the coffee table that had his bag on it, "Scarlet died along with my parents in Mission City three years ago. She was twelve."

Mrs. Stephan or Nicole couldn't help but gasp at Skyler's situation. The feelings of uncertainty and distrust in this person, disappeared and was in turn replaced with pity. She had only heard from her husband that Skyler was searching for his missing twin brother but had not heard he had lost his other family members as well. "I'm sorry."

Skyler shook his head, "It's alright, I've managed to move on… for now." He then focused back to what he was saying, "But the real reason that really caught my attention were your drawings of your robot friend here."

Tiffany frowned at Skyler, "What's wrong with my drawings of my small robot friend?"

"Well…" Skyler drifted off as he walked over to his bag on the table and took out a casino-sized shuffler and placed it to the floor.

"Is that an automatic shuffler?" Jake asked.

"Not quite," the con man said in an amused tone. He tapped Flipluck lightly, "Come on, you can change into your bi-pedal form."

The girl was curious what Skyler meant in 'bi-pedal' form. She kept her eyes on the shuffler from over her hospital bed. As quickly as Skyler said it, she watched the shuffler expanding, gears turning, whirring, and transformed until she was facing to a familiar robot form. The very same robot she had played with her from her dreams.

"Can I play now?" the Sparkling said as his hands still gripped on Skyler's jeans. Flipluck seemed rather uncomfortable with new people around him he was hiding behind Skyler's leg.

The spectators of the room were in awe of the small robot. Tiffany looked to her parents, "Mom! Dad! It's him! The same one from my dreams!"

Skyler smiled at their reactions and turned to Flipluck with a look of encouragement, "If you wish to play with her, why don't you ask Tiffany?"

Flipluck was feeling very shy seeing as it was his first time he had met humans that did not have a Cybertronian scent on them. He was still peeking from behind Skyler's leg processing whether it was a good time to ask or not.

Tiffany giggled and smiled at the small robot, "It's okay. Don't be shy."

Flipluck let out a small approving chirp as he looked to Tiffany. With a bit of courage he asked, "C-Can I-I play with you?"

The younger girl smiled, "Of course you can. What's your name?"

Seeing he was accepted by his new playmate, Flipluck pointed to himself happily, "I'm Flipluck!"

"I'm Tiffany," she said and called him over, "Hop on to the bed."

Flipluck wasted no time as he scrambled onto the hospital bed. From his compartment of his chassis that was a part of him, he took out a deck of playing cards. "Play?"

"What game?" Tiffany asked.

"Umm…" Flipluck knew his caretaker wouldn't appreciate him playing gambling games with her so he thought of a simple one, "Forty one?"

"Alright, you deal first," she said, as she knew the game's rules. Her smile grew wider as she saw how expertly Flipluck mixed up the cards in various shuffle styles.

Looking upon the stranger and as well the savior of his daughter, Jake noticed from Skyler's expression that he wanted to talk about it. Jake gave Skyler a searching gaze, "I'm grateful for the help you've given us and even to make Tiffany's dream come true. But I feel like there's still something you don't wish to tell us."

The con man sighed, "I do have my reasons, considering what's happened to me is so farfetched I doubt you'd want to hear it."

Nicole didn't like what he was referring to, "You're saying that we won't believe you."

"Like I said," Skyler huffed. "It's not a story a normal person would believe in. Can we take this outside somewhere private?"

Both parents nodded and went out to the corridor after first letting their daughter know that they were going to have a chat with their guest. The two youngsters welcomed it, as they were already too busy with their attention on a card game. The room across them was fortunately unoccupied by anyone, so it was a good place to keep their conversation private and avoid the security cameras at the same time which Skyler was silently thankful for.

Nicole who was very inquisitive about her daughter's new friend asked, "How did you meet up with Flipluck?"

The youth smiled and in turn said, "How much do you know and feel about aliens from outer space?"

* * *

While Skyler was away with the sparkling, Sunstreaker was pretty much on his own with Skyler's uncle.

Even though they were pretty consistent in blackmailing each other to the limit since that morning, the two kept it on level so they didn't go overboard. To Sunstreaker, Skyler's uncle character wise was somewhat similar to Ironhide when it came to fighting just minus the full-of-himself-when-it-came-to-weapons part. When the mech asked why he wasn't into it, Robert only replied dryly that it was Taylor's (Skyler's father) job at that, which came as a surprise given that, for as long Sunny stayed with his charge, he was quite the opposite. Imagining a not so extremely modest version of Skyler was rather alarming.

_Pit, even Robert says that his brother believed in 'Bragging Rights' or BRs._

The mech involuntarily trembled. So what if he was not modest of himself, but Sunny never did go to the level that he had 'Bragging Rights' like Skyler's father. Sunstreaker was now starting to understand how easily Skyler ignored his antics when it came to those 'I'm-the-best' situations. His human charge simply had _too_ much practice on it.

Robert for now was mostly quiet and working on Skyler's Blackberry, which was being modified so it wasn't easily tracked down. It was useful, but Sunstreaker wasn't really all that worried as Skyler bought a couple of cheap used or even second-hand cell phones earlier as he was quite insistent that when he used a number he'd throw away both the card and the phone in different locations. Supposedly, because this was his main phone the mech predicted it needed the best sort of security it could get.

Wondering on Skyler's father more than just what he was like, there was one thing that made the bot curious. Out of all the time spent with Skyler and even his uncle until now, there was no mention of what occupation he had. Thinking it was a good time to ask, he did so.

"Robert?"

"Yes, Sunstreaker?" the other replied.

"I've been wondering what Taylor's occupation was. Could you give some insight on it? Skyler doesn't seem to talk about him too often."

Robert seemed to having thoughts on the matter in particular, "How _much_ do you want to know?"

The mech rolled his optics and sighed, "Your paranoia is astounding, Robert." He snorted, "I think the answer would be as far as you let me if it's what you think is best for your nephew. I'm not here to be a burden on you or Skyler."

"I suppose," the elder con man and FBI agent nodded. "Taylor was a smart and witty brother I had, as much as his modesty was off the roof. In normal day to day life people knew him as a translator in the military circle, mostly for weaponry trade or your basic freelance military weapons expert."

_Interesting. _The mech predicted that Skyler's family had links all over the place, although he did not expect the military. Not when his father had his own 'other' notorious reputation. Now he needed to know the other 'hidden' side. "And the part he plays for the Con family?"

"He was our detail man, our weapons and explosives expert, and translator for dealing negotiations with other con families," Robert said in a serious tone. "Just make sure that if Skyler asks how you know, you didn't hear it from me."

"Why?"

"It's painful for Skyler to relieve the memories of his father," Robert said. "They had a minor disagreement before the Mission City incident happened. He may have moved on, but it's not something he can easily mention."

"The fact that his father was a weapons and explosives expert?" Sunstreaker asked skeptically.

Robert looked at the mech with a tired expression, "Skyler was going to inherit his role in our Con family, even though Skyler's knowledge is diverse on weapons he had his sights on other things which was hacking and being a painter." There was a weary pause from the man. "Let's leave it at that, Sunstreaker."

"Funny, I heard him mention his father once before," Sunstreaker stated.

"Oh?" Robert seemed interested all of a sudden. "What was it about?"

"How information detail is important no matter insignificant it may seem. If you keep looking and checking consistently you'll eventually find what you're looking for," Sunstreaker explained as he remembered it was also the time Skyler found his twin Sideswipe. "He didn't seem distraught at that."

Robert's facial expression didn't change much, there was a small smile, but soon after it disappeared, "Those were his better memories of my brother. He had his own way of being a good example to his children."

"And the not so good?" the mech asked hoping he could get an answer.

The FBI agent said, "Things before Mission City happened, like I said before." He went back to what he was doing, which clearly gave the message 'I won't tell you'.

Sensing it was a time to stop asking questions, Sunny was silent. Now everything was starting to fall into place, the reason why Skyler had sniper training, why he was knowledgeable about weapons, and even the military itself. What was the human saying? _The apple does not fall far from the tree._ The mech now had a feeling that Skyler was much more than he had credited the young con man for.

Sensing something in his scanners, Sunstreaker found out that Robert was shuddering. _Perhaps a memory or something of what might happen soon?_ Sunny wasted no time, "What's wrong human?"

The human to Sunstreaker's annoyance stayed silent as if arguing to tell the mech or not. Sunny was not a mech who liked to be ignored.

"Fine, don't tell me if it's a bad time," the mech grumbled.

"No, I think it's the right time." Robert sighed heavily. "And to the right person."

"What do you mean?" Sunny asked warily seeing Robert's change in his demeanor.

"I think you are more aware than I am what will really happen once this hack is over," Robert stated like a professional FBI agent. "Whether we like it or not, Skyler will remain a target."

Seeing that the human was probably going to do something the mech questioned, "What are you intending to do, human?"

"Lead the authorities off Skyler for a while," the elder man said. "Leave a few red herrings here and there. Of course I'll try not to get caught in the process."

Sunstreaker didn't really believe his audio receptors. Skyler's uncle was going to give false information to the other humans! Either this human was mad or he really was willingly going to play suicide to help his nephew. Sunny had a feeling of the latter. "I'm not sure how human law works but if you're charged for betrayal how is that going to work?"

"Most likely you and Skyler won't hear from me again is the worst case scenario," Robert gave the obvious answer. "Tell him when the time is right."

Looking at the human's eyes, there was no indication he was going to give up. Sunny sighed, "You're really not backing away from this, huh?"

A curt reply. "Just so you know you'll not be alone in the fight."

"Helpful, human, but not so much on the guilt side," the warrior bot said sarcastically. Robert certainly had a knack to persuade someone to do what he wanted easily.

Robert then pulled out an external hard disk from his pocket, "And also give you this."

"Feeding false information _and _leaking out internal Intel?" the bot exclaimed. "This is suicide! Those human authorities will kill you for it!"

"Better than getting Skyler killed and regret it for the rest of my life while wondering what I could have done to help him," Robert snapped back. "Are you in or are you out?"

_Not like he gave any good choices on that. _It was an either a 'Yes' or 'No' question, Robert had planned to make sure there wasn't any other options since the wasn't going to back off because he'd be a coward. His honor as a warrior bot didn't allow that, and he doubt he wanted any more of his ego flattened to the ground. The mech breathed out in defeat, "Slag it. I don't like it, but I'm in."

"Good," Robert nodded curtly. "Every single organization or association each have their own communication devices always have a frequency ID, no matter where the agents are it's always active; unless you happen to know how to deactivate it… or to leave it behind."

"You left yours behind where you're staying I'm predicting?" Sunny guessed. Skyler's uncle did and always had a thing for paranoia.

The human said with sarcasm, "Well it wouldn't be good if they found me with Skyler in future investigations, now would it?" He then added, "I was lucky enough yesterday that I left it behind because I thought I was doing some minor recon."

"What data are you giving me?"

"A complete communications device ID data," Robert smiled. "I heard from Skyler your scanners could detect Decepticons because of their specific signatures. Since you're guarding my nephew, I'm letting you on this data. That way you'll know who to avoid on the streets, it includes FBI, NSA, CIA, local police enforcement, and a few other known investigator groups. Scan people on the road Sunstreaker and you'll know the disguised agents around town and be able to add in the people you should avoid."

Sunstreaker couldn't help but be surprised he was silent for a few seconds. The mech declared that con men were officially _insane_ when they put their minds to something. However, behind all that Robert was saying, Sunstreaker knew the hidden message. The warrior bot vowed, "I'll do what it takes to make sure Skyler doesn't get killed."

"Glad you're catching up to the details, mech," Robert smirked happily that the bot was smarter than he had expected him to be.

"Hmph, you're underestimating me," Sunny shrugged as he opened his door letting the human enter his interior to hook him up with the data. "No point of keeping your nephew out of danger when he'll be running to it and it'll be useless for me to say he won't come to harm. Plus, I've been in war far longer than humans have lived; I'm not a stranger to an Intel war."

Plugging into the slot Sunstreaker provided him he said, "I'm trusting his life in your hands."

"I know – it's not like I want to let him die. If he did, it still won't be a good thing because Steve is with my twin, Sideswipe," Sunny assured Robert. "Besides, I still owe him for finding out where Sideswipe is. I'm not going to drop the bargain I made with him. I like to keep my word, human."

"A warrior to the end?" the FBI agent asked.

"It's more a part of me than just my programming," Sunny stated as a matter of fact. An idea came to him. "I just didn't think of a paranoid person like yourself as a softie though."

A scowl was evident on Robert's face, "Not a WORDto Skyler on that."

"I don't think the 'softie' part was a part of the agreement," Sunny teased finding new blackmail material.

"Sunstreaker!"

_Who knew that Skyler and Robert were so alike?_

_They were family after all._

_It seemed Con men had a pattern that could be read if one was acute to know were to 'push buttons'._

_Might as well have a bit of fun while it lasts._

* * *

_At the Nevada, US Military Base…_

Steve sighed as he looked at the large computer that was about 10 ft away from him.

They weren't going to let him _touch_ a computer!

The youth scowled with contempt.

Thanks to the mishap that he was responsible with Sideswipe and Jolt, he was prohibited to even _think_ about touching a computer. To his dismay, that meant including when the hacker war with SonitosUnda. _Correction – it was actually the Decepticon Intel Officer named Soundwave. _While it was shocking to find out that both he and his twin were able to defeat Soundwave, he was worried that Skyler would take the bait and decide to take on the hacker without him knowing who he truly was.

If that happened… the Decepticons would hunt after him.

_Skyler, what ever you do… don't take the bait!_

"You okay, Steve?" the blond beside him asked. There was a fluctuation from his scanners, which indicated that Steve seemed to be afraid of something.

"Not really, Sides," Steve said truthfully snapping out of his thoughts and masking his worry for his twin quickly and efficiently. Seeing as Sideswipe was here, he figured an instant diversion wondering why the mech was here on the platform with him in holoform. His alt-form was at the other side of the main hanger. "It's kind of odd, but- why are you here? No offense or anything, but you just don't seem to be the type of bot that would be into all this encryption stuff."

Sideswipe shrugged uneasily as the human was avoiding his worry completely, "Big Boss ordered that I'd be your bodyguard...for now. He'd said there are a couple of humans who are set on meeting you."

"Galloway?" Steve asked dryly. The holoform only nodded. "I wonder how that happened," he said sarcastically.

_Seriously, that dude is creepy. Note to self: Stay close to the Autobots. Like my life depended on it._

"Other than that, Prowl's not too happy about the prank you set on him and my 'encouragement' to let you into the mess with me. So… this is my punishment to stand guard and _do_ _absolutely__nothing_." There was an evident bored expression plastered on his face. How was he going to 'guard' Steve in a 'guarded' base? Ok, the defenses were nothing like Diego Garcia, but he highly doubted the Decepticons would knock on their door right now. At least when they were hacking into the NEST Intel… Come on, Soundwave was not _that_ stupid.

Steve laughed light-heartedly at that which caused the mech to give him a quick-glare, "You make it sound as if it was the most boring job in the world."

"Of course it is, not like I can squish the fragger," Sideswipe grumbled. "Stupid rules, if he wasn't around we'd be getting better results on the 'Cons than getting through your ridiculous 'red tape' which he is making it harder for us." Ironhide was restrained by both Will and Optimus not to do anything rash, Sides himself wasn't that lucky hence he attacked the liaison when he was at his worst from missing Sunny and hating the man's 'guts' as human say it from the beginning.

Steve nodded to that silently. He wasn't the one for politics, but even in the military, it was rather dangerous to get dragged in by power hungry politicians who were craving for a higher spot and nearer to the President of the United States. The young hacker was well aware of Galloway's position right now. It wasn't good for the Autobots since he had power to tell the president false accusations about the Autobots, he was sure Sec Def Keller was having a hard time to make a good impression of his job with Galloway around.

Speaking of the Secretary of Defense… he was _HERE._

It wasn't good that if he did get caught or even Skyler did, then it was getting caught by the 'big guys'.

The Sec Def was currently talking it over with Optimus (bi-pedal form), Sam, Simmons, Major Lennox, and Sergeant Epps on what seemed to be a moving high platform that was to connect with his own platform. Steve wasn't the one to be afraid of heights, but he was fascinated by how the stuff at the NEST base was full of contraptions that adapted to the needs of the Autobots and human allies alike. It was like watching the 'Gulliver's Travels' movie, only the Autobots were a whole tribe of giants.

Most of the Autobots were in alt-form where they were positioned so that things could run smoothly. Other humans included a few NEST personnel, Mikaela, and Leo were there.

Across the hanger they were in, he was surprised there was a portable yet Cybertronian sized 'laptop' that was connected to the human's internal network. It was sufficient for now (as their main computer was at Diego Garcia), but Steve was doubted it could handle the next hacker war. Prowl and Wheeljack were up and checking the systems. Steve eyed at the Autobot strategist as he was listing off things on a data pad. Considering his alt-form of what seemed to be a police car, he looked like a Cybertronian cop already. Wheeljack took a military Jeep alt-form, which Steve was explained he wasn't picky with his choice and more concerned with just learning anything about Earth and his inhabitants.

"Well, Steve, what do you think?" a female voice with an Australian accent attached to it.

Steve faced Maggie Madsen, a Signal Analyst who worked under Keller thanks to her efforts during the Mission City incident. They briefly met when he was dragged by Simmons to meet the crew from the Pentagon. "It's a pretty decent firewall you got there from what I'm looking at, still, doubling defenses won't work. I'm pretty certain of that."

Maggie was not impressed with the man before her, "What makes you so sure? I know you're not allowed to touch the computers but you can pinpoint out what's wrong."

"To be blunt I'd say pretty much everything is worthless," Steve huffed. She was going to get angry, but he quickly cut in with forgiveness in his voice, "Look – I'm Sorry – I don't want to be a pest or anything, but creating a firewall based on the previous version usually doesn't work, even if you did double the power. It's the same method; hence it will have the same vulnerability as before." The hacker than added, "This is Soundwave we're talking about. He busted the system last time, he will this time even if it takes more force."

An African-American large young man called Glen Whitman came up to him, he was wearing a sports jersey, "Forget using a new system, it's the best we got for now. You did great on solving those codes, but it doesn't look like it's going to matter for now. They're more focused on getting everything buffed up. I hate this idea as much as you do but I'm not in charge here." He seemed disappointed but holding himself from lashing out as he didn't want to bother the edgy Sec Def who his boss was now. "Orders from higher-ups, man," he whispered to Steve. "I'd use a couple of my own tools and software but they're probably nothing compared to what the _Furta Duo_ have."

The female signal analyst sighed, "This is more of an experiment of the government are pulling though. Supposedly, the Cybertronian firewall was easily hacked before so it's like they're seeing if the Autobots can be trusted to defend the Intel servers." Quietly she added, "Galloway's not here, but he did pull more strings that if the Autobots fail this one there's going to be liability issues and whether they're worthy to be allies or not."

Steve didn't like this one bit. "That's crazy! He's demented enough to sacrifice the whole USA Military &amp; Defense Intel?" he whispered back harshly. "Just how bad does he want the Autobots gone? We'd be helpless against the Decepticons!"

"Now you're seeing _why _I want to slag the fragger?" Sideswipe asked sarcasm in his words. "He couldn't care less about us; bet you anything he's still bent on getting our technology."

The hacker was clearly disturbed, just what was going to happen to the Autobots if they failed? If his twin took the bait first, the 'Cons were off on the hunt for Skyler as he was sure that Soundwave wanted to find the hackers that were a threat to his job and the Decepticon faction. It wasn't going to be easy on his part if the NEST Intel or any sort of Intel fell to the 'Cons, as he was sure that once the Autobots were gone… _Galloway__ was going after him next._

Seeing as Steve had nothing left to say, Maggie and Glen were back to the computers and occasionally discussing their plans with the other signal and code analysts that were on the lower level of the platform for preparations. Sideswipe seemed to be distracted as his eyes in his holoform were slightly dim as it was a sign he was most likely browsing through the internet or something. The thief sighed to himself about whether he should stay put or not. Skyler wasn't the one to back down from a challenge, but he did swear that he was never going to use the _Lazaros_ on this situation again.

Steve looked at the main group of leaders again to see an extremely frustrated Simmons that the codes Steve worked on were ignored completely. The con man wasn't surprised at all; he was expecting the government wouldn't care at this stage. They were just simple elaborations of the codes on paper and nothing compared to what the _Lazaros_ was truly capable of.

Either way, it was still a stalemate for Steve as he lingered on his thoughts.

And from any point of view, it was either the whole country was screwed, Skyler getting hunted down by Decepticons, or him getting trouble. Perhaps in worst circumstances, all three combined. He trembled at that thought.

Steve hated in making really difficult decisions. He winced at the thought how much jeopardy he put Uncle Robert in about his work as a FBI Agent.

_I hope I make the right choice._

And silently he hoped Skyler did too.

* * *

_Back at Oakley…_

Skyler sighed as he was dropped off at his current 'home' from the hospital by Jake. So the couple freaked out about knowing that aliens exist and that Flipluck was one, but once he explained that Flipluck was a child and the censored version of the sparkling's story (separated from his kind) they eased up a little. He was glad enough they were okay with the idea Flipluck was only playing with their daughter once they saw for themselves that Tiffany was enjoying the small mech's company and smiling.

Since the con man had time to kill before lunch, he managed to help out the sick girl in giving sketching tips. Flipluck not wanting to be left out also taught Tiffany, which made Skyler happy that the sparkling was now more confident in interacting with humans. As the sparkling's caretaker, he was proud that Flipluck and Tiffany were both happy and tolerant despite their differences. With all the happiness around him, Skyler watched as time went by so fast he had to excuse himself because he needed to get home and do a few 'chores'. Flipluck finally finding a new friend to play with was insistent that he wanted to stay, so Skyler promised him he'd pick up the small mech from the hospital no later than 5 pm.

_Uncle Robert was right; it was probably the best distraction for Flipluck and as well time to focus the serious task at hand._

Skyler wasted no time as he immediately headed towards the garage. Once he was in the room, both attentions from the mech as well as his Uncle were on him. By the look on his Uncle's face, he was glaring at the mech over something. His uncle's head snapped to him when Skyler raised a questioning eyebrow.

"None of your business," was a short crisp reply said. And as if nothing happened, Robert went back to the gadget he was working with. The mech for the other hand was uncharacteristically silent.

_Just what sort of trouble did Sunstreaker get into this time with Uncle Robert?_

With dozens of questions in his head and going into Sherlock mode he asked the Autobot warrior curiously, "What happened here?"

"Nothing you should be concerned with," the bot said almost too innocently.

Hearing the tone in his voice, Skyler skeptically thought that was the case. It was basically the soft version of saying, 'it's about YOU, but it's between ME and HIM'. He sighed, and decided not to bother with it. It was an unspoken rule about privacy when it came to con families, and he'll deal with it. It wasn't in his place to know unless either party was willing to tell him what they were talking about. He'd rather not get into a mess he wasn't supposed to deal with (like a simple fight in blackmailing).

Skyler sighed, "So, the preparations are good?"

"Yes," Sunstreaker said rather reluctantly. It was sufficient, but the mech wasn't hoping they'd get exactly the right results. Humans still had primitive technology. "All you need to do now is to log into the system you created. It's best that you log into it as an 'invisible' status, whether Steve will use it or not."

Skyler nodded, went to his laptop, and logged in. He began to type the batch of codes that were going to hook up with the recording software he installed so that the event was going to be recorded in every point of view possible. Codes, algorithm, even to data input and output was going into this. Thankfully, he had bought a portable external hard disk of one terabyte. Still he was having doubts that it actually would fit Cybertronian data, but he only hoped the hack was going to be the recording only.

The con man faced the mech, "Sunstreaker, did you find anything else from the previous recording of the hack?" The Cybertronian codes were difficult to decrypt, but thanks to the warrior mech they did find out that Soundwave had a specific pattern when he hacked something. It was like a signature.

Sunny was hesitating but chose to tell both humans anyway, "I'm not sure why, but Sound'aft seemed to retreat at the point where there were too many codes being transmitted by the end of your previous hacker war. It just makes no sense at all."

Robert's interest was now on the mech at this new information, "Wouldn't it be logical that he was overloaded with data?"

"Of course not, human!" Sunstreaker snapped. "Soundwave re-programmed himself and discarded anything to do with his emotion programs so he could sufficiently process through more data more quickly. It slagging explains why he's the most emotionless and has the largest memory capacity of nearly all Cybertronians alike. It's impossible for him to get overloaded with data with the amount humans have!"

The younger con man only blinked with disbelief. _True, Cybertronians did have data capacity over who knows how many exabytes._ It just wasn't possible by human terms either. It was a major rule when someone hacked in that it was crucial to use as least personal data as possible, and hack in from several servers simultaneously; if possible, from servers that were overseas on a different continent. However, even by using the 'layering technique' Skyler was sure that it wasn't enough to overload any sort of human computer, let alone a highly advanced sentient robotic alien race.

From what he heard from Sunstreaker, Soundwave didn't sound like your typical evil bot.

Skyler couldn't really think there was a person who went lengths to erase their emotions _completely_. It was really just too creepy to take in someone who _lived_ did that. The message was clear that this Decepticon wasn't going to play nice at all, and everything was going to be rational. Even the con man was sure playing on emotions wouldn't work on the bot. Perhaps a frontal confrontation was best to be avoided. This was pretty much a game of chess where one had to read the opponent's move, not the opponent themselves like in poker.

"Anything else we've got?" Skyler asked hoping for more information.

The warrior bot sighed, "None. I'm not exactly like Wheeljack or Prowl who are programmed to handle this sort of data to the fine details. It's the reason why you're having more tools for the record this time around."

Nodding in understanding Skyler looked to what time it was.

It was 1:50 pm according to the clock.

_Another 10 more minutes before my life goes by Murphy's Law._

Skyler wiped his hands over his face in frustration.

_I have to survive whatever comes at me soon if I'm going to get to Steve._

There was no backing out now.

* * *

_NEST Base…_

After being bored of looking through the human's World Wide Web, Sideswipe decided to look at the clock instead as the countdown to Soundwave's attack on their servers was about to commence. The warrior mech wasn't surprised how many of the humans in the room had their hearts starting to pump at a higher rate through his scanners. Some have even started to fidget in hopes to distract their nervousness away. It was less than 10 more minutes everything was going to start.

Their Human Prime or Sam Witwicky was one human who without a doubt was nervous. The warrior guessed that because of Galloway's interference in political grounds that if they lost this battle there was going to be trust issues going on. No doubt about it, it seemed to be heavily weighed on the ambassador as all the hard work he'd put into this could be destroyed in a few seconds.

Sideswipe then shifted his optics to his leader who then tried to ease his brother's worry. Optimus was as calm as ever, as many were counting on him to be the foundation of their morale whether it was from the NEST personnel or the Autobots. Even so, Sides noticed he was just as concerned as his brother Prime was but held his ground firmly to be strong when others could not be.

Following suit in his example was the human Secretary of Defense, while Sideswipe didn't know him personally; the mech did respect the human for being a man of his word, loyally supporting NEST to ensure that the war didn't take toll on both allied parties. John Keller was on their platform with Master Chief Sergeant Epps keeping an eye on his two workers Maggie and Glen who had access to the main computer.

Simmons on the other hand had the secondary computer, with Sam and Will standing quite a distance behind him and nearer to the edge where Optimus was standing. The ex-agent for Sector 7 was trying to motivate himself through mumbling that everything was going to work out although there were signs he was clearly going to freak out or go on the fritz. To Sideswipe the human was like Earth's version of Prowl when it came to facts or statistics only with more sarcasm and disturbingly, at times, 'fanboy' behavior.

The warrior then gazed to his current charge to the left of him who he was attending to this moment (as laughable it was since there was no danger around).

What Sideswipe saw on the human's face and body language was _different _from the others.

While the other humans looked nervous… he was _upset_.

Steve did mention he wasn't really feeling well about the whole hacker situation, but from what the mech could read from his face, he was extremely worried. The hacker did manage to hide it about an hour ago yet it seemed to have come back. Sideswipe noted how he was gripping his clipboard tightly until his fist looked white, as if he was straining on himself for something. But for what? Thinking it was an idiotic idea to ask he was okay or not as it was obvious that Steve wasn't, Sideswipe thought of another question.

Carefully he put a hand on the youth's shoulder, slightly moving Steve to the back to get a better space for more privacy. He didn't care if his leader heard their discussion with Cybertronian hearing; at least Big Boss knew what to tell others and what not too.

Quietly Sideswipe whispered with his hologram, "What's bothering you?"

Steve was very tempted to give Sides a silent treatment, but seeing as the mech was the one who saved his life he decided against it. He only said a word, "Everything."

Sides raised a brow, "Explain by what you mean by everything." He gave his charge a good stern gaze.

"You really think they really can pull this off?" Steve sighed frowning. "I – I don't know about Cybertronian tech specifically, but – Soundwave busted the one before and –

"You're really sure that this time our firewall won't work?" the blond holoform finished.

The hacker nodded miserably, "Yeah – I – Uh, Simmons explained how Prowl and Wheeljack's firewall worked this morning. It's just – not strong enough."

Watching the human's expression, Sideswipe refused to believe it. However, Steve was the very same human who was able to go through the security programs that Wheeljack had on his upper lab; there was a chance that it he meant was right. "How come?" Sideswipe questioned why.

"Well – Prowl made it clear that Soundwave hacks by connecting himself into the system," the hacker explained quietly. He then deducted, "However, because the system is static here on Earth, it's not a difficult job to read the pattern of how the system works and take a shot at the vulnerabilities." Steve fidgeted his hands on the clipboard, "It's like taking a pick axe and knowing where to strike on the tip of the iceberg, but what you get is that the whole iceberg is obliterated to pieces."

Sideswipe would blame that on the fact that Earth technology was primitive, yet he thought better of it as the Autobots had helped in maintaining and upgrading the system too. Truthfully, he didn't understand on what Steve was trying to say how Earth's system was 'static', but all the same time, the human seemed sure that they weren't going to make it.

The holoform sighed, "You have a proposal on how we might be able to stop it? We don't exactly have the right time to get another system going on right now."

With those words, Sides could only watch, as the human was more discouraged.

"But – How are you going to make it up if you fail –"

"If we do, we'll try another way, Steve," Sides cut in, giving a pat on the back lightly. "Just believe in Big Boss and Prowl as well as those other humans like Sam and the Sec Def. We'll pull through whatever happens, as we did many times before." The bot gave him a wink that everything will be all right no matter what happened.

Steve could only look at the mech's holoform uncertainly. He understood what was _really_ going on, and was sure of the consequences. Yet, the faith the mech had in all these people around him was surprising. The con man still had his own issues of trust even though he had managed to make a few friends with a couple of the NEST personnel and Autobots. It wasn't that all the NEST personnel trusted him either. Prowl for one didn't trust him entirely no matter how much Steve helped out with the codes. Ironhide was starting to ease up on him after the prank but the trust issue was still there even if it was small.

Would these people care if Steve helped them? And how would Skyler feel if he blew his cover?

"Sideswipe?"

"Yeah, Steve?"

Carefully the youth asked, "If you were in a situation that your life was on the line, your faction also on the verge of death and even your twin as well – which would you pick to save?"

Sides was startled at the question that came out of nowhere, but he only answered, "I can't pick any, honestly. If Sunny offlined I'd live a crippled life, if the Autobots are gone – the war would be over and I'd die sooner or later hunted by Cons, and if I was offlined Sunny would most likely follow after me. That's a tough question."

"But choices have to be made, right?" Steve pointed out. "Reality keeps coming at you no matter if you do or don't do something."

The blond holoform looked to Steve as if he remembered something, "That's true – Yet, in the end you only have to make one choice."

Steve raised his brow, "Which is?"

"Do what's right," Sideswipe said determinedly. "Not the easiest road to drift by, but if I took it because I felt it was the right thing to do, I'm sure Sunny would get angry at it first. He'd call me an idiotic glitch, but he'll understand even if he doesn't like it. I'm sure the other Autobots will eventually too."

"You speak like it's a personal experience," Steve blurted out.

"It is," Sides shrugged. "With our war and all – it happens." A pause. "'Bee's voice capacitor was crushed because he knew it was right to keep to his mission so the All-Spark could be released into space. However, you've seen him here now overcoming his inability to speak normally."

The youth thought of it, "Does this have something to do with Sunstreaker?" The holoform looked discomforted at the question. Realizing it was a mistake Steve quickly apologized, "Sorry – I shouldn't have –"

"It was Sunny's decision," Sides sighed as he decided to tell the human. He wasn't sure why he was telling Steve this but he wanted to make his point clear. "He ordered Red Alert to get me away from the battlefield because I was more badly damaged than he was. Sunny made a decision he'd stay with the other bots and hold off the main Decepticon army so they didn't reach Tyger Pax's Central until the All-Spark was launched even though it was a diversion mission." A tired pause. His voice turned sour, "My twin knew I _hated_ it – the all 'being protected by his larger brother' scrap, even though I was already a full-fledged warrior – I was _furious_ at him even when I was in the Med Bay at that time."

There was a moment of painful silence before the bot continued. "It wasn't till later on I realized I nearly got myself offlined on the battlefield. Ratchet mentioned I was hit on a vital energon line and my sensory system wasn't working properly. I couldn't feel it, but Sunny did…" A sigh. "The mission was a failure, many offlined and missing; they reached Bumblebee's team. Since then… Sunny's been missing."

Steve could only give a sympathetic look, as he couldn't imagine the pain of getting separated like that, if it came to Skyler. By what he heard, Sunstreaker took probably a 'hard road' but all the same it was what he thought was right thing to do; the life of his twin came first and to keep fighting off the attack. If there was something that the human noticed on the holoform's face, it was a face of regret.

There was a bitter laugh, "Well – Sunny always did believe in his 'paint master's' words: 'Do what is right. You are strong.' I never believed in them because they sounded silly to me back then."

"So you finally made your own choice as well?" Steve inquired from all he heard.

"That's right. Nice guess, Steve," Sides smiled a bit but his expression still solemn. "I chose to follow Optimus' call to Earth." It was a decision he made to make it up to his twin. "And somehow I hope Sunny hears it one day… and comes here too."

The youth smiled at that, "Thanks for the enlightening story. From what you said about how you felt Sunstreaker, who knows, maybe he's closer than you think he is. I'm sure we'll find him somehow and sometime soon."

Sides chuckled, "I guess so. Although don't count on it too much. You looked really depressed as if you screwed up on something. I thought it'd give you a good life lesson, and it's the best I can do. I'd still bet you any amount of money that Big Boss can do it better."

"Nah," Steve shook his head. "I'd rather hear it from the mech himself. I'm okay now. Thanks, Sides."

"Good to hear that and, you're welcome," Sides nudged the human playfully back. He couldn't have stand it to see someone who was in a position like his own and suffering. The warrior bot was still feeling slightly guilty he was the cause of Steve separation from his twin.

As soon as the clock finally ticked to 00:00:00 the alarm of the servers being breached immediately blared in the hanger.

"Sec Def., sir! Someone's already hacking in! It's Soundwave, sir!" A soldier yelled as the alarms for computers now fired up.

John Keller immediately issued the order, "Engage! Keep Soundwave off our servers with whatever you have!"

Glen immediately knew they failed as the indicators on his screen had turn red so fast, "It's not working! Our firewall's busted!"

"All our firewalls were hacked in less than 10 seconds! We're re-routing to the Autobots' Intel defense systems!" Maggie responded as she typed frantically. The signal analyst watched in horror as Soundwave's signature signal was getting stronger.

Optimus turned to his subordinates, "Prowl, Wheeljack, status?"

Wheeljack did not like what he was seeing, "It's slowing down, but we're getting negative readings, Prime. Seems like Soundwave was prepared, he's not taking second chances."

"All of our Intel shields are declining at a 20 percent faster rate than before," Prowl reported. Soon the room filled with dread as the defenses were crushed to nothing. "I do not wish to be that bearer of bad news but Soundwave has somehow programmed it so that if we forcefully disconnect, all Intel data will cease to exist."

_Then chaos filled the hanger..._

On the screen the loading bar was active:

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 2.09 PERCENT ~**

It had begun…

And it showed no signs of stopping…

* * *

_Decepticon Airship, The Nemesis…_

"Initiating Hacking," Soundwave declared as he was set on his task.

In the confines of the Decepticon spaceship, many red optics were on the communications screen of what was the main bridge of the ship. Of the many bots that were present, the leader of the Decepticons was there himself to oversee the proceedings of the sabotage mission into the Intel servers of the Autobots and their fleshling allies.

"Well done, Soundwave," Megatron's voice echoed in the room as his optics bore keenly at the screen. He had waited for this for quite sometime after their previous failed attempt. After the whole Egypt incident had left the Decepticons more vulnerable than ever before, and adding in another weakness to his faction was not something Megatron would tolerate. "Keep with my plan to lure those fleshling hackers in. I _must_ know who they are."

"Of course, my Lord," the communications officer said dutifully faithful.

With those orders, Soundwave boosted the amount of data that was taken from their enemy's Intel servers. The Intel officer felt a bit of satisfaction as he was back here to take on revenge on those fleshlings that had somehow to defeat him before. As much as he deleted his emotional programming, the feeling of failure to meet his lord's standards last time left a feeling he had not felt in a long time.

_Emotions: __True anger._

Nonetheless, he was more prepared this time. He _will_ succeed. Soundwave had his guesses that the Autobots already had the real hacker with them (a fleshling by the name Steve Knight), but he wanted to make sure. _Very sure._ And if it was the case, he'd do whatever it took to take the hackers out without a thought and with permission from Megatron himself. Laserbeak's failure of retrieving the hacker was planned, yet that did not mean Soundwave was pleased that he had a failure on his reputation.

_Come and challenge me, hackers._

_You will not last against me this time._

* * *

**TBC...**

**  
**

  



	14. (PART II): The Hacker War Gamble, It All Comes Down to Slaggin' Luck

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 13 (PART II): The Hacker War Gamble, It All Comes Down to Slaggin' Luck ~**

* * *

_Nevada US NEST Base…_

_  
_

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 25.87 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

As the brightest scientist and the most trusted bot in handling these types of situations, Wheeljack had certainly had better days than this. Yes, the mech was well acquainted with things when it came to Cybertronian technology (Decepticons or otherwise). Nonetheless, there were times that Wheeljack had problems with integrating Cybertronian tech with the human's less advanced technology. It was problematic on the compatibility side that Cybertronian encryptions worked with less than desired results.

His now destroyed Intel shield was the proof of that, even though he had worked on it very thoroughly for the last few breems after going it over with Prowl.

In just mere seconds his shield was shattered by Soundwave.

Even now, no matter what he and Prowl tried, it wasn't helping to slow the loading bar down.

Prowl was already predicting that there was absolutely no chance of success in stopping the hack.

On the opposite end, Wheeljack was hoping a miracle that would turn the tide.

 

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 40.61 PERCENT ~**

 

Human analysts in their respective fields were frantically trying to communicate through the connections to try preserving any sort of data they could possibly save in the small amount of time they were given. Their leader of the operation as well as the man behind the defenses of their beloved country barked out orders to see what they could do. John Keller wasn't going to give up on this just yet, and he stubbornly refused to see their Intel crumbling on his watch with his own eyes.

NEST had worked so hard to make it this far into the negotiations between both humans and the Autobots alike that the Sec. Def. wasn't going to give up until he made sure that every single method possible was used to stop this.

Yet, fate seemed to want to play a game with them.

The numbers now were at the point that they were coming to the point of no return.

 

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 51.28 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

Steve was in his own silent state of uncertainty.

Having an internal debate wasn't helping him at all.

Even with Sideswipe's advice on doing the right thing, had only made him more confused.

_What exactly was the right thing to do?_ Help these people who had saved his life and so many others from the Decepticons, or help his twin brother who was notably missing and perhaps avoiding these people from hunting him down? His sub-conscious was screaming at him loudly that he needed to make a decision here and right now. That itself was also leading to his worst dilemma. He had to choose; and he knew he had to make the right choice.

_Which did he have to sacrifice?_

_All these people… or his own blood twin brother?_

"Glen!" Maggie shouted over to her hacker partner, "Can't you use your own hacker software? We could try and slow Soundwave down that way!"

"Are you kidding?" Glen yelled back. "There's no way in HELL to interrupt a hacking when it's in progress unless you shut the whole damn thing down!" He seethed in frustration. "And if we do, there goes all the Intel of the United States!"

Maggie yelled in a frustrated sigh, "Isn't there anything we could do?" She sighed afterward in despair as she mumbled, "Shit, we're all going to lose our jobs for this." Her eyes started to water over all the effort all of these people around her had put into NEST. Just as they were up on their feet after the incident in Egypt, now NEST was on the verge of getting disbanded again. Perhaps this time, because of Galloway, it could turn permanent.

Chief Sergeant Epps sighed crossing his arms tightly into himself as a way to calm himself down, but was failing miserably. When he turned his gaze to his war buddy, Major Lennox looked like he was ready to pull all the hair out of his head. Sam was probably in a worse state than the Major was as he mumbling the word 'no' over and over from his lips. As for Simmons, complete utter misery was written across his face; no matter what he tried to type in everything was denied by the computer in front of him.

Epps blinked suddenly when a hand landed on his shoulder. He turned his attention and found out it was Steve. "What's the matter kid?"

"You think you could let me help out?" Steve asked nervously as he wasn't sure he was going to be let near the computer.

"Hey, I'm just a soldier here," Epps said in a peaceful gesture. "If you really want to, you can ask the Sec. Def., but from how we're looking, we're done for."

_It was now or never._

Steve closed his eyes as he made the single most painful decision that he had ever made.

It hurt his heart more than anything bad he had ever done to his brother.

_I'm sorry, Skyler. I'm so sorry._

"I _can_ help," Steve begged worriedly as his eyes dashed from the screen to Epps. He said everything next as quickly as he could, "Come, on. I know I was wrong for hacking into Wheeljack's upper lab, but you just can't let this go while there's still a small chance."

"Steve?" Sideswipe asked uncertainly why his charge was worked up all of a sudden.

Epps wasn't so sure about it, "Kid –"

"Look – ," Steve interrupted. "I'll try to use the codes we figured out since I've been on base. Please – just give me a chance. If not, we're all going down without a fight." The last words came out as a desperate plea.

The warrior mech's holoform looked at the sergeant, "Give him a chance, Epps. I think he really means it." Sideswipe had a feeling since the beginning of this hacker war, that Steve had noticed something. If it was true then maybe Steve had something that could help with their situation.

Epps silently thought about how Steve had helped them all this time. Even when he never had met Sideswipe before, Steve was willing to help out the warrior mech at staying on duty by burning Galloway's prosecution letter. Personally, Epps didn't want to go down without a fight as well. He sighed in defeat and gave an approving look, "Alright, no promises about him saying yes."

Steve breathed in a short relief, "Thank you!"

 

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 69.14 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

Both Sam and Will were called over to the Sec Def between the two platforms regarding what Sergeant Epps suggested that Steve requested to be given a chance to go against Soundwave.

Sam was the first to agree, "Sir, I absolutely vote he should try." Feelings that rolled off the bond both he and Optimus shared was as clear as day. Sam knew the Autobot leader was struggling to think of any other way to face their problem. The Autobots were just as stumped as the humans were when it came down to it. Another factor was that Simmons seemed to give him eye signals that he wanted Steve desperately and try those codes he worked on with him (Steve) in what ever way to save their Intel.

Looking to his partner, Will knew Epps had something in mind, and he trusted Epps with his life, "I don't see any other way, Sir. We should have started from the beginning with him."

When Keller turned to the watchful gaze of Optimus Prime, there was a sense that the Prime without a doubt would support whatever his choice was. Gravely knowing the circumstances and that there was no other way, the Sec. Def. turned to his subordinates. "Glen, Maggie, I want you two to step back."

"What?" Glen gasped in shock.

Maggie frowned, "Sir?"

"_Now_," Keller said, saying it with the perfect tone that it was an order.

The two warily stepped away from the computer screen.

Steve was surprised when the Sec. Def. looked at him sternly._ Is his he going to say yes?_

John Keller could do nothing else then usher the young hacker, "Go Steve, give it your best shot."

"Yes, Sir!" the youth saluted briefly. Without a second to lose, Steve dashed for the main computer and his fingers blurred as they typed.

He was running out of time.

 

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 78.71 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

All the Autobots in the hanger were slightly shocked to see that Steve was being given a chance at fighting Soundwave.

:: Hey, why did he get da chance at going on the comps? :: Mudflap complained on the public comm.

Skids shrugged. :: I don't know 'bout you, but wasn't he like – banned for good for what happened to us? ::

Jolt only sighed over disagreement from the minor twins, :: Hey, look in the situation we're in now! We're glitched as it is! Even Prowl and Wheeljack got their 'afts kicked by Soundwave! ::

Red Alert seemed to shiver as Ratchet muttered that his paranoia glitches were starting to act up. The femmes as well as Bluestreak, Hound, and Mirage were in a quiet conversation with each other but supported their Prime's decision (both human and their Cybertronian Prime). Bumblebee and Ironhide had been way in front of them giving their approval to their respective charges.

The more Steve typed, the more Wheeljack was impressed, :: Amazing, the human's capable of inputting codes that have not repeated in the last 5000 characters that have been typed! He's remembered it without a fault. ::

This of course caught Ratchet's attention, :: What? Is that true? No normal human could have done that so quickly! :: This time the comm. was directed to his Prime. :: Optimus, I have never heard a human with a condition like this. ::

:: We will try to ask Steve when the time is right. :: the Prime said reminding his CMO of the situation they were now facing, although he was just as curious like his subordinates. :: For now, I wish for all of you to remain calm as possible. ::

The whole hanger was starting to see the difference as the bar was visibly slowing down.

"No way," Simmons gawked as Steve entered in the codes they decrypted earlier.

Maggie and Glen could only smile because they found something so amazing in their area of expertise because to them, there was something they could learn from Steve in improving their own skill. Still, with tense anticipation the loading bar was still moving to make the final mark.

_Would they make it out of this one?_

_  
_

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 99.98 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

Steve's hands blurred like a mad man in typing the last digits.

_Damn it, damn it, damn it!_

_Nearly there…_

_  
_

**INTRUDER ACCESSING NEST SERVER**

**~ LOADING 99.99 PERCENT ~**

**  
**

Getting to the last operation order, Steve slammed the 'Y' key on the keyboard.

_WORK DAMN IT!_

_  
_

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 99.99 PERCENT ~**

_**~ACCESS SUSPENDED IN 00:10:00~**_

_**  
**_

There was a dead silence in the hanger, but no sooner later many people breathed out a sigh of relief.

Even the Autobots vented our air from their air vents as they just barely avoided the worst scenario of Soundwave's attack.

Steve wiped a sweat from the side of his head, "It'll stop that – for now." His heart was already thumping hard on this one; he took it as a sign to calm himself down before the next one.

"Ten freaking minutes and still we're nearly fried!" Simmons said ironically. He was still sweating bullets, "Is this all you got, kid?"

"It's the best I can do without a hacker program, Simmons!" Steve snapped at the other computer operator. If he didn't step in, they were all doomed. And now with barely a 0.01 percent there was no room to change to any sort of other Intel defensive mechanism. He didn't think there was another way around this except on activating the _Lazaros_.

Just as Simmons about to retort, Optimus stopped him, "I think that's enough, Simmons. Steve did what he could. We're lucky enough to be given another chance."

"Yeah! But we only got TEN minutes!" Simmons argued. He checked his own screen, "Steve did stop it for a while, but it doesn't change the fact we can't cut Soundwave out of the connection. We've got only one shot at this because there's barely a percent left!"

Major Will called a time out for everyone, "All right everyone, we need to chill! Panicking isn't going to help us get anywhere. Anybody have any ideas while we have the chance to use them?"

Painstakingly, the hanger was silent with only murmurs of uncertainty went through the human Intel team and a dead uncomfortable silence from the Autobots' public comm.

Optimus Prime looked toward his second in command and the Autobot Scientist. :: It there any chance both of you can stop it? ::

:: Sorry, Prime. Not this time, the second the counter is gone, all the data will be too. :: Wheeljack said disappointed and apologetically to his leader.

The same opinion came from Prowl, :: The difference in percentage will not make our efforts suffice. This battle is over, sir. ::

The CO of the Autobots was also on the verge on giving up, but he did not want this to happen. He was sure no one in the hanger desired it. It was then he felt something from his brother Prime, Sam. Unlike all the other humans that were trying to figure out a way out of their sticky situation with despair, Sam's feelings were somehow filled with tiny glimmer of hope. Optimus' optics shuttered in question as he wondered what the cause behind it was.

It was then the Prime looked upon who Sam had his eyes focus on.

The hacker that gave them this one chance, Steve Knight.

As the eyes of the Autobot Ambassador met the Autobot's CO optics there was an urge through the bond that they shared. Sam Witwicky was urging Optimus that perhaps Steve was the one that could help them out, even if there was a feeling that may have seemed to be wishful thinking. Seeing as there was no one else who had ideas on stopping Soundwave and Steve just been barely successfully at it, the Prime decided to act on Sam's behalf.

"Steve Knight," his baritone voice echoed throughout the hanger in a way that all who were there had their attention on the Prime.

In a shock the human gulped, "Y-Yeah?" Having the large CO of the Autobots have his optics on him was sort of frightening.

"Would you know of a way to stop Soundwave under these circumstances?" the Prime asked with hope.

_Oh, crap. Why am I feeling really guilty for some deluded reason?_ With all the honesty that Prime put out through his voice, Steve cursed over why the con man could never con on an honest person. He felt like being scolded very kindly from a caring mother. "T-There's something I could t-try," he gulped now hating that he was becoming everyone's point of attention.

"Please do so," Optimus said earnestly.

Steve again face to the screen and started to type in more codes. Many of the signal analysts was were slightly worried when they picked up a signal that something else was coming for their Intel severs. Maggie was about to report her concerns to her boss until Steve waved them off.

"It's all right, it's friendly," the hacker said as the unidentified thing they detected came to their screens. The screens were adorned in blue moving frames of floating circle loading bars on the background, but what caught their attention was a login screen that prompted for an ID and a password saying:

 

**~ PLEASE ENTER USER ID AND PASSWORD TO THE LAZAROS ~**

**  
**

"Now there's a SHOCKER!" Glen said pointing at the screen with disbelief at what he was seeing. He must be totally DREAMING. All the hackers in the world had been searching high and low for it but it was never found. Maggie couldn't say anything as her mouth was wide open.

The Sec. Def was just as stunned as the rest, as he himself had heard a myth about how this program was floating throughout the Internet and all those times he denied his Intel Officers who worked under him, that it did not exist as there was little proof. Yet to see it here with his own eyes under the young hacker's command now made him acknowledge it existed. He breathed blinkingly and asked the hacker, "You think you can help us with this?

"I'll do what I can to help," Steve assured the Sec Def. He then nodded gratefully at Sideswipe. "Thanks for reminding me, Sides."

Sides did a double take and stuttered, "R-Reminding you to do what?"

"Of what it meant to do the right thing," Steve said. And with that he typed in the _Lazaros_ and started to log in.

Epps looked unsurely of Steve, "Kid, you okay with this? It's one huge responsibility here."

Stopping from just pressing the 'Enter' key the youth looked back at the Sergeant, "I'm sorry if I wasn't honest with all you guys from the start, but it was actually supposed to be my responsibility since the beginning."

While all who were there tried to figure out what Steve had meant, the young con man lightly pressed the key 'Enter' as a male voice came out and said:

 

**LOGGING IN…**

**ACCESS APPROVED**

**WELCOME TO THE LAZAROS:**

_**~ RecordatioFurtaCorona2 ~**_

_**  
**_

_First the Lazaros… then the REAL hacker in front of them._

If possible, most of the humans in the hanger gaped even wider and even the Autobots also took a while to recover from shock as some of them in alt-form slightly moved back.

"YOU'RE THE HACKER WE'VE BEEN SEARCHING FOR?" Glen exclaimed as he pointed at Steve.

* * *

**LAZAROS NEW UPDATE**

_**~ RecordatioFurtaCorona2 IS ONLINE ~**_

_**  
**_

_Both uncle and nephew cussed and cursed._

_The mech of course was glad it wasn't heard by a sparkling's audio receptors._

Skyler felt like he wanted to bang his head on the desk, "Ugh. Great. Just _great_! I'm _officially _screwed now." Steve definitely had logged in with full active status on the _Lazaros_.

"Skyler, we don't know if he was forced to obey the military," his uncle reminded even though he wasn't exactly content with the situation either.

"But I don't _feel_ like Steve's being forced to. It feels like he's doing it voluntarily," Skyler argued. There was no way Steve had given up in an interrogation; but that didn't mean that he'd do it unwillingly.

"Skyler's right. It's not like the Autobots would force him. My Commander's not the type of bot who'd force something on others," Sunstreaker backed up. "We're officially hunted now."

The youth was fuming. _Damnit… if Steve was pushed do this then maybe I should…_

"No," Robert said at his nephew knowing what the younger con artist was intending to.

Skyler blinked. "Huh? What –?" He was irked that his uncle had a gift of reading him easily.

"You're NOT helping Steve," the elder said sternly.

"But –"

"Remember our agreement, Skyler!" Robert shouted scolding his nephew. "It's already bad enough you will be hunted down! Don't think about giving them any leads!" The FBI agent wanted to make sure Skyler would get the best head start in all of this. There was no way he'd leave his nephew to die by the same people who were the cause of his brother's death, he wouldn't allow it; not when he still had the chance to help out and had a say on it.

The younger con man instantly went silent, and kept his face down. _I hate being helpless!_ _Why do every time I want to help Steve I end up only watching?_ Skyler cursed to himself. Thankfully amongst his unstable emotional side of his mind, his rational one kicked in. His uncle was right he needed to endure it for the long road ahead, but it did nothing to ease the angering sensation that was pent up in him. He gritted his teeth as he focused on calming himself down. Skyler loathed leaving to let his twin face this one alone.

Sunstreaker grumbled, "I know you hate watching this, Skyler. But this time you have to _trust_ Steve on what's he doing right now. TRUST your twin."

Skyler gave out a frustrated sigh, "Okay – Okay – I'm cool – I – Damn." He stopped there as he remembered that both he and Steve had a strong connection to each other.

On many occasions, Skyler never knew how strong their 'bond' was but if he was angry with this then maybe Steve would have felt it too. There was no point on making it worse for his twin; Steve didn't need any more pressure for what he was going to do. Still angry and badly losing against his own will to keep himself still, the youth closed his eyes and filled himself with the feeling of approval. It sounded crazy or insane, but he hoped Steve would know he'd approve on whatever he was doing even though Skyler was feeling angry at himself for not helping his brother when he needed it the most.

* * *

Simmons was just as surprised as everybody but he did not expect that Steve was the second hacker they had been looking for all this time. Yes, the ex-agent was feeling angry that Steve led them on a wild goose chase but here he was in all his glory, the infamous hacker _RecordatioFurtaCorona2._He knew better than the rest when hacking came to age, the internet was an information highway; even those who were 14 could become good standard elite hackers if they were mature enough. Someone at the age of 21 given the right time, experience, and tools would've been an expert.

As Steve overlooked the tools he needed from the _Lazaros_, Simmons asked, "How long have you been hiding this, kid?"

Steve didn't look back as he had more important things to do, but answered with a short reply, "Before I was kidnapped." He kept on opening so many windows so quickly and typing batches of codes to them that made Simmons figure he would've been a good Sector 7 agent if they had found him before Mission City.

"Steve, can I ask you why you have said that you knew only parts of the code?" Sam voiced out his concerns. Obviously form what he was seeing Steve knew all along. "Uh – I know you haven't trusted the Autobots or any of us back then, but why did you have to lie?"

The hacker stopped for a moment as he assessed that the program was going to load for duration of seconds, he turned to his attention to the others. "It wasn't lie. I'm aware how encryption with the _Lazaros_ works but to do it manually without it altogether consumes more time. As long as it's not too random I could work things out." He then gave an example, "Back when I managed to free the hostages from the explosives I did all the decryption by manual methods."

Major Lennox on the other hand asked a more specific question, "I heard you actually said the same answer to Galloway, and why is that?"

"From the way he was interrogating me," Steve sighed showing his dislike for the man, "I had a feeling he had his own agenda. If he discovered who I was then, there was a chance he'd use me to unlock your technology through data encryptions." Hopefully that was a careful and detailed answer. With the expression on the Major's face as well as the human supporters, Steve was sure they were shocked to know how Steve knew Galloway wasn't what he seemed.

Epps was baffled, "How did you know that Galloway was a sneaky liaison? I was pretty sure from the way he talks we were worried about him convincing you to go against us when he dragged you off without our permission to the interrogations room." No one surprisingly complained about the 'sneaky' comment.

Now the youth had an unpleasant look on his face, "It's not that hard to see how he was talking about you guys that he hated you with some sort of passion. He seemed to lead the interrogation into trying to blame Sideswipe in doing more damage than good when he saved me. Even if I haven't met Sides directly then, I still won't put that blame on someone who saved my life." Steve wasn't going to tell about how he knew the liaison before hand, besides, that information was a part of his Con family Intel.

Sideswipe couldn't believe how Steve had defended him before they ever met; humans were surprising in so many ways that Cybertronians couldn't comprehend.

Reading the human's reactions and analyzing the reasons why he hid his true identity to Optimus Prime's optics was reasonable enough. The news of Galloway intending to go so far on trying to have information wasn't new, but it was not to be taken lightly for the future. On the other hand, Prime judged that Steve was trustworthy in a sense that he was smart enough to view the whole situation first before making the choice on what was right for him. If anything, Optimus was glad that Steve chose well, and with Sideswipe's help the boy had trusted the Autobots now.

Seeing as time kept ticking towards the deadline the Prime immediately questioned the hacker, "Steve, if you use the _Lazaros _right now, would it be able to stop Soundwave as it did before?"

"I'll try to do it," Steve said with a hint of worry. "I'm only concerned that it's not going to be as strong as before."

"And why is that?" Prowl asked as he walked over to their platform. He was curious to how this system which had defeated the Soundwave before.

"I don't have my partner with me. He's not online within the _Lazaros_. The system works at full capacity with two people working simultaneously," Steve explained.

Thinking of an idea Maggie then suggested, "Can not one of us take his/her place?"

Steve shook his head, "He's the only one who has access to his part of the system. Our passwords are at least 35 digits long. They're extreme case sensitive."

"Extreme case sensitive?" Glen asked as a mind boggling question.

"Short version would be nearly every single key on the keyboard counts. Add in the Num Lock for extra sensitivity, so numbers are also case sensitive." the hacker answered. "Good luck finding that password in less than 10 minutes. And even if you got past that, you'd have to understand the encryption and how it works as well. The _Lazaros_' encryption is unique and one of the kind."

Sec. Def. Keller nodded as this although inwardly he was getting more shocked as he heard more information on how the Lazaros' security was heightened. "Do you have method that it could strengthen it?"

"Yes."

John Keller didn't want to waste any more time, "Glen, Maggie, and Simmons, help Steve do what he needs to do." He was going to make a risky decision on this. "Everyone else, I'm going to take full responsibility for you if all else fails, I will issue an order for you to cut the server hard lines."

Everyone in the hanger tensed at that even those in contact with the Pentagon through the video teleconference.

"I know this is a difficult decision, but it is better than having all our Intel in the hands of the Decepticons," John Keller declared. "Back to your stations!"

Steve wasted no time in requesting a web cam or any sort of camera from Glen and Maggie. They both had questioning looks on their faces but it wasn't surprising because they knew that Steve's program was not normal for normal hackers.

While the humans were busily getting ready for with the time that they had, the Autobots were busy discussing amongst themselves in an internal comm.

:: I didn't think we had the _real_ hacker right in our hands all this time. :: Wheeljack voiced his opinion. :: Optimus, are you sure we can trust this to him? ::

Optimus' voice was slightly worried, :: I think we don't have many options left, Wheeljack. Soundwave did overcome our Intel defense systems. I overheard that it seems Steve understood something about the technology humans posses that has become our weakness to our firewall. Of what and how, I am uncertain. :: He then paused. :: However, the fact that we have a clue that his hacker partner is a male human may be our next issue whether this Intel breach succeeds or not for the Decepticons. ::

Ironhide then put the pieces together, :: It's starting to make sense Optimus, his partner _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1_was behind the freeing of the other hostages back in Kansas City; he was there to help Steve out. Our only problem is that his trail has completely disappeared. A grunt was heard over the comm., :: Slag, this couldn't get any worse. ::

:: With all due respect, sir, is it possible to ask Steve to who his partner is? :: Prowl recommended. :: The Decepticons will know that it is Steve that is with us here. I would not be surprised if they will target the other hacker as a means to have him as a hostage or worse to be eliminated. ::

The Prime disapproved of that, :: As much as I would hope to keep the other hacker safe, that would be Steve's decision to tell us. We won't be the only one to worry about the safety of the other hacker. ::

Jazz joined in the conversation, :: I'm betting the 'Director' is interested in getting' the other one since Steve's with us. :: Their commander was certainly someone who they'd count on to think further.

:: Precisely, Jazz. Director Galloway was already intent on using Steve against us, there is a likely chance he would go after his hacker partner. It is without doubt things will become much complicated after this. :: Optimus said gravely.

When everything in the hanger was set, Steve fired up the Lazaros' capabilities to the maximum of what it could handle by a single operator. For many in the hanger, their eyes were wide eyed as the loading bar dropped so drastically fast at one point. However, the hacker knew this was just the beginning as the _Lazaros_ was only capable in lowering down the loading data by half.

Everything else like the outcome was determined by how Steve would wipe out Soundwave from the server.

The hacker cracked and then flexed his fingers.

_This was war._

* * *

_Decepticon Spaceship, the Nemesis…_

A roar of shock and frustration echoed throughout the bridge.

And courtesy of an infamous ruthless Decepticon Leader, two bots ended up being torn to pieces.

The whole situation was happening again, a hacker of the _Furta Duo_ was responsible for it.

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 49.99 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: INITIATING COUNTER MEARSURES ~**_

_**  
**_

Starscream as much as he didn't like being defeated by the humans slightly grinned, only because he liked to see Megatron going into an uproar. He had always known that the more they underestimated the humans, the more the insects were somehow evolving quickly. This situation was proof of it. So, it was indeed true that Steve Knight was the hacker as this 'program' the fleshlings put forth as a defensive mechanism was operating from the NEST server. The conspirator let his red optics focus on Soundwave wincing so little that many of the other 'Cons did not notice.

His optics narrowed at it. _Interesting._ These humans could prove well to his own plans to lead the Decepticons and overthrow Megatron.

Thinking he had seen enough and he would eventually know the results later; the Seeker slowly retreated out of the room.

He had plans to make.

As for what the Seeker had witnessed, the Intel Officer of the Decepticons wasn't faring too well. In a few seconds flat he did not expect the human's program to make absorption of all the data he took just beforehand. However, he did not show any weakness to the other bots in thinking it would not bode him well if they had any leverage on him. Why this program affected him so, he did not understand. He had previously tried to search for it over the fleshling's network several times before but with no results. He was NOT going to fail for a SECOND time.

The smaller bots that were connected to him, mainly Laserbeak and Frenzy's remaining brother Rumble, could only tremble at their master's fury throughout the bond link they shared.

An angry Soundwave was very unheard of, but when he did mean to offline his targets, they were sure the targets won't get off lightly.

Soundwave growled as his processors were again pushed to his limit just as it did before.

What was causing this? And how did the humans figure out this new technology?

The pain was now traveling through his connection to the server…

* * *

_Oakley…_

For the elder hacker twin, he was finding it very difficult in stopping himself to think about literally running to the laptop and login into the Lazaros here and now. Skyler gripped his right arm and grimaced as his eyes were on the frantically changing codes and numbers on the screen. Now that the real war was going on, he had it hard to stay put and follow what the mech and his uncle wanted him to do.

_To do absolutely nothing, but watch._

_Easier said than done._

Being a twin wasn't really helpful in this situation as Skyler was already starting to sense Steve's distress in him like waves. Add in the fact it was building up in him was making his rational mind lose the battle with his emotional one. It was like having another person stabbing him with a crowbar to his stomach and they were pulling it out of abdomen so slowly it irritated him he wanted to make it end. His body would like to do nothing better than help the other half that was in trouble and erase all the danger away. The youth was very surprised how he was instinctively acting that way, he figured because this was probably the first time Steve was a more stressful situation that the connection between the both of them was reacting more violently than it had ever been.

Scanners focusing on Skyler, Sunstreaker was now starting to notice how strong his human guide's bond with his twin actually was. The mech knew it wasn't going easy for Skyler enduring this, and perhaps having Robert making him sit away from his laptop was a good idea so Skyler couldn't interrupt what was happening. His human charge was just a few feet away sitting on a chair that was just beside his alt-form.

As for Robert, he was going to be absent for a while as he said about having going to the 'back' and answering nature's call.

Seeing that is may be a good time to try and communicate with the young con man, Sunny asked, "Skyler?"

"What do you want, mech?" Skyler snapped in an annoyed tone. The hacker gritted his teeth as his head was starting to throb. _Damn it, I don't need more distractions._

"You're losing it," Sunny stated as his scanners confirmed the human's stress was rising.

The young con man glared at the mech, "You think I _wouldn't_ be? I feel like half of my body's reacting to danger on its own and I can't even do anything!" He breathed out a heavy sigh. "I _want_ to help Steve!"

Figuring out to snap the human out of his panic, bluntly the mech said, "Well you WON'T be helping at all if you interfere with this, Skyler! If Steve did agree to help the Autobots, have you ever thought that Steve wanted you to AVOID actively accessing the _Lazaros_? He's trying to PROTECT YOU, slag it! Don't try to do something that would make his sacrifice be in vain!"

"But I never –"

"It was HIS choice!" Sunstreaker shouted back. "Whether YOU like it or NOT, you have to RESPECT that! You've said it yourself you'd try to avoid regretting making a decision if you ever got the chance; then DO IT!"

Skyler snarled as he stood up and stared angrily at the Autobot's alt-form, "What are you angry for? This doesn't have anything to do with you! What are you trying to say? I CAN'T save my twin? B*LLSHIT!"

"STOP BEING A STUPID ORGANIC, SKYLER!" the mech's voice thundered. The growl coming from the car was dangerously getting louder. "You THINK Steve WANTED to you to get caught up in this? He's probably just as HURT as you are! You think it's EASY making a decision in saving your twin when his life is on the line? THEN YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW I DON'T WANT TO SEE THIS REPEATED _AGAIN_!"

Dead silence.

Sunstreaker jolted in dread of what he accidentally slipped out.

_PIT! That shouldn't have come out!_

_What?_ Skyler's composure immediately shrunk into shame. _Again?_ _Oh, God… he couldn't mean about Sideswipe – _The youth gasped in sorrow,"I shouldn't have– Sunstreaker, I'm Sor –"

"Drop it – I don't _need _your sympathy," Sunny angrily warned to the point that Skyler was scared he was shivering just by hearing the mech's voice.

Yet, it didn't stop there.

"I'll be blunt and I'll tell you the truth. I WAS the one behind my twin's separation! Is that SLAGGING clear? I knew Sideswipe would stick with me through and through if we both got caught by the Decepticons. But I knew that his injuries were so severe then and I ordered another bot to get him off the battlefield." The Autobot grumbled. "I knew he would HATE me for it, but he eventually would understand. What I didn't realize was that my plan had a flaw, and I didn't realize that until it was too late."

All that was left was a voice of utter regret, "I made a mistake in taking on the wrong bot. All I ended up doing was making my twin suffer and I was forced to close our bond link." The last part came out of a choke. "We've been apart ever since."

Even though he was an Autobot warrior, Sunstreaker could never be cold when it came to his twin. His spark throbbed horribly in pain as the echo of a missing bond bounced back to his chassis. Only to see it all over again with Steve making the same decision as he did was a reminder for his own failure back then in returning to Sideswipe. Sunny cursed as his temper was now raging; he had to stop this as it wouldn't make his situation any better if he left Skyler.

The youth was at a loss for words; it was like losing his temper over again since the funeral of his parents and sister. Skyler never intended to hurt Sunstreaker by reminding him of his worst memory, yet behind all of that the youth realized where the mech's inflated ego and not caring attitude had came from; they were part of the shield that the warrior mech defended so heavily because of a past he could not fix.

Skyler wasn't sure what to say, but said what he could and made sure he avoided giving the mech any sympathy he didn't asked for. "I screwed up before, Sunstreaker. I just – don't want to lose my only direct family I have left. Letting Steve go is so – _hard._" The final word came out in a whisper. He then groaned, "Shit, you probably think I'm so weak now."

Sunstreaker heaved and sighed, "Hmph, not really. You're not the only one who hates being weak when you're needed to be strong at the worst moment." A snort. "Sometimes you can't help feeling hard about letting go."

"But it just feels so wrong," Skyler complained.

"It's what elder twins or brothers do isn't it?" Sunstreaker pointed out. "Do their best to protect their younger sibling?"

Skyler looked back at the screen that was active on his laptop from a distance. The loading bar wasn't going forward or backward at 55 percent as both his twin and Soundwave were clashing against each other. He soon realized he had a lot of growing up to do when it came up to his psyche and sighed, "Yeah. You're right mech." A pause. "I need to let go."

"Don't worry, human," Sunstreaker replied. "You have a better chance than I ever did back at Tyger Pax."

The youth blinked, "Why?"

The Autobot said, "You've got control over this situation… and I'm not going anywhere until I pay my end of the bargain. I'm with you till the very end."

A small smile. "Till the end it is mech. And I'm still going to make sure you get to Sideswipe." Skyler finally calmed down, "Thanks for snapping me out of it."

"I know you'd do the same without asking me too," Sunstreaker said indifferently.

Just a few seconds later, Robert came back into the room seeing his nephew was quiet and controlled. The FBI agent had his own suspicions that something happened when he was absent from the room because he heard shouting but couldn't make out the words. He knew there was an argument but problem at least seemed to be somehow resolved and silently went back to his job.

Skyler this time loosened himself up and did what he needed to do.

_I trust you, Steve._

_I trust you._

* * *

_Nevada NEST Base…_

Over the passing minutes that were going by so painfully for all the people in the hanger, and went by so slowly that the hacker war was lasting more than a lifetime than previously.

Leo had to admit that he was so shocked he could really just drop to the floor at what he was seeing. Sure, he was with the other Autobots who were in their alt-form with Mikaela on the other side of the hanger, but this event beat all the odds he had faced with in his life. Well, except when he nearly got sucked up by Devastator – but that was besides the point. In the first counter to slow down Soundwave, Steve did what many considered the impossible. Combining some of Glen's software into the system encoding to create a more variable array of random codes the _Lazaros_was emitting and powering it up. Hell, and that WASN'T even considered an UPGRADE!

Add in that Steve was using a camera that was for the Eye Tracker application installed within the _Lazaros_ amazed many in the hanger further. Leo had seen this technology himself how it helped disabled people who couldn't use a mouse for their computer by having contact lenses as an alternative device. But using this sort of technology for hacking and selecting all the codes from a buzzing sea of digits while incorporating it with typing codes simultaneously? IT WAS CRAZY.

_INSANE!_

Thinking of getting his eyes off the moment from Steve, he looked upon the Human Prime. Being Sam's friend and as well as his roommate, Leo looked at how Sam was really hoping Steve would get past this in victory. It wasn't hard for him and by reading Sam's lips he was saying: 'You can do it!' repeatedly. The ex-owner of the blog Real Effing deal dot com could sympathize that if Steve did somehow screw up, Sam was most likely not going to sleep for a week going through those diplomat meetings.

On the other hand, things were now starting to become like they had felt previously.

Even now _RecordatioFurtaCorona2_ or Steve, looked like he was suffering.

Major William Lennox was looking traumatized just how focused Steve was, he did not dare to barge in or say anything. With over ten minutes of continuously typing on the keyboard was enough to make him feel very remorseful for the kid. He swore to himself he was going to make it up to Steve after all of this was over. _If they won._ If they didn't, then NEST was no more. How the hacker kept on like this only made the Major hope it ended soon with victory in their favor.

Steve's eyes watered horribly as tears fell down from looking at the screen for long blinking when he needed to. He didn't have a clue when of how long it would take Soundwave to back off. His whole face was drenched, his hair so oily he could feel more sweat starting to pour down his face. The hacker was tempted so many times to wipe his face as irritable sweat were mixed with water and salt. However, he didn't dare to.

_The fate of all Intel of his whole country was on his shoulders._

His breathing was now deeper than it was, Steve was sure his brain was forcing him to take in more oxygen. It didn't help either he felt his head was now throbbing like tomorrow as his blood vessels in his temple as well as the back of his head was pumping faster. A huge headache was building up.

_Stay awake! Stay awake, Steve! You got to survive this!_

_  
_

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 66.35 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

Still the numbers kept increasing as if were mocking him there was no hope.

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 68.01 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

When was the torture going to end?

Sideswipe was now getting extremely worried for his charge. His scanners were indicating that the human was going to start hyperventilating. The mech was no doubt disappointed why the other hacker never made it or even logged into the Lazaros when his partner was in torment like this. All the same, Sideswipe wasn't sure why Steve was there going and going. Being an Autobot warrior, and never into this sort of advanced hacking, Sides swore he would have blown his processor.

Speaking of processors, Sideswipe was rather amused when Ratchet forcefully deactivated both Red Alert and Prowl so quickly and (incredibly quietly) as he thought it would be best those two would not as the human terms 'blow their brains out'. It would've been funny under normal circumstances, but it was logically the best course so they didn't have to deal with more cleaning up to do later on if things turned out for the worst.

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 72.75 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

_He wanted to give up._

_Oh God –, he just wanted it to STOP!_

His body was starting to take its toll and he was trembling on a few codes that he slowed down to make sure there were no mistakes. Steve just couldn't afford to make any mistakes.

He was now fighting a losing battle.

Despair gripped him now that he was just hanging for the sake of his betrayal to his twin. Steve just didn't want let it end so badly, not after he betrayed his own family, his twin, Skyler. He couldn't think of the thought of after he betrayed Skyler to save these people he would end up failing. _No! Not Now!_ His eyes were now starting to drop real tears from his heart.

Steve was sure a simple apology wasn't going to appease what Skyler was going to go through after this.

_It hurt so much._

_  
_

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 88.99 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

Optimus Prime gazed worriedly as Steve's state. It didn't take a bot genius to figure out he was ignoring Ratchet for his pleas to make the human stop what he was doing; the young man only a year less old than Sam was under severe stress. Nonetheless, the Prime stood at his place and kept on believing the human, just as Sam went through the many hardships he had to face when he died and was resurrected again. Sam's feelings were very much extreme that Optimus himself was finding it difficult to make himself not to get overwhelmed by it.

Who wouldn't be? The numbers were still against them.

To make matters worse, they were doomed.

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~93.73 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

Back to where it started.

This time Steve was ready to give up. He just couldn't take it anymore!

_He failed._

_He failed Skyler._

Steve never felt so hollow in his entire life, as after the death of his family… he failed his last family member left.

…_Wait._

The hacker blinked confused even as his fingers were on frenzy on the keyboard that it looked like it was on autopilot.

_What was this feeling that went through him?_

_It couldn't be – Could it?_

_Skyler?_

Just as Steve was going to give up, he felt as if his twin was there saying that he was with him. He couldn't believe it, but his brother was watching this and was supporting him! All he could feel was warmth and support; like as if he woke up early in the morning to greet the sun on his face. His face nearly broke up into tears as he was just so glad that his previous worry of betraying his brother for that brief moment was gone. Now with new vigor, Steve focused his eye movement to be more erratic and random than before to make the last stand against Soundwave.

He was fighting this with Skyler.

In the last effort to ditch the very same _SonitusUnda_ they fought before, Steve gave it his all.

As if a miracle happened, the numbers were starting to decrease.

One of the signal analysts yelled in surprise looking at their monitoring systems to the Sec. Def., "Sir! Soundwave's signal signature is weakening! It's weakening!"

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 72.75 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: COUNTER ATTACK ACTIVE ~**_

_**  
**_

That wasn't just the real bombshell for the whole hanger, as just as Soundwave's signature was clear as day – the screens flickered and in barely less than an astro-second, and the Lazaros proclaimed its status leaving the NEST soldiers, personnel and all who were there stupefied.

 

**NEST SERVER**

**~ 00.00 PERCENT ~**

_**~LAZAROS: ALL DATA RETRIEVED BACK SUCCESSFULLY~**_

_**FIREWALL STATUS: MAX**_

_**  
**_

Like it was after a whole eon had passed, the hanger exploded into a roar of victory, claps, and many hugging each other that NEST was able to see another day again. Even all the Autobots had transformed to their bi-pedal forms in celebration. The major threat for now and the days ahead of them were gone for this moment.

Steve smiled happily and weakly as he got a pat on the back by a grinning holoform of Sideswipe.

_I did it Skyler! I did it!_

The next thing he knew and without realizing it, his body was on the floor and his face felt the cold metal of the platform.

His brain slowly told him that he fell with no warning at all as it screamed for mental rest.

He could only hear voices shouting his name as his vision blurred.

Finally knowing it was over, he let go.

Steve blacked out.

* * *

"Skyler! Are you all right?" Robert asked as he saw Skyler suddenly fell over to one knee.

The youth grunted, gasped and breathed slightly heavily, "Ugh – I'm okay; I wouldn't say the same for Steve though. He probably knocked himself out." He massaged his head to ebb away the pain. Since when did things like this started to feel more real? For once Skyler was starting to wish they could share the more positive things instead. _Bloody wonderful, now he's sharing the headache with me!_

He sighed as he tried to get his bearings on his feet again. Skyler noticed he was sweating so much he couldn't even imagine the state his twin was in.

_He really hoped Steve was okay._

Sunstreaker was slightly worried at Skyler's reaction, "I wouldn't be surprised, and the amount of codes he did was probably more than enough to knock a normal human out. You should rest a bit."

Skyler shook his head, stood up, as now he was in a state of haste, "Later. We _have_ to leave tonight. I got to get everything ready to depart; it's too dangerous to stay here any longer."

Robert nodded at that, "That's true. I'll help out with all the things to pack. How's the data we collected?"

"Fully intact. Now it's a matter of time to get it to Uncle Nagel," Skyler said showing an external hard disk.

"I'll make a backup for it," the mech said. "You both clean up this place for tonight, my processors won't take too long."

The youth nodded, "Thanks Sunstreaker, I'll get in touch with the Stephans about Flipluck too."

As the two humans cleaned up the house in anything that would lead to them, Sunstreaker was quickly able to make copies of the most recent hack Soundwave did. The same thing happened to the 'Con communication officer, he was repelled off from the server. However, the cause was far from being found out considering now evacuation plans were the most important.

Watching Skyler with a fierce determination in checking everything in the garage as well as packing everything, Sunstreaker knew that the next battle was going to be tougher.

Staying still and waiting, the mech secretly tested out the data that Robert gave him, which amazingly gave him a detailed location of Robert's communication device location which was at a motel. There wasn't any other sort of frequency, meaning he was the only agent in the area of the city.

_Well, at least it's working._

_After all this mess, I have a feeling that I'm going to owe Robert for this._

* * *

_Nemesis…_

The Leader of the Decepticons was more furious than he had been in months.

Their opposing faction, the Autobots, were yet again a step ahead of them in the war.

Soundwave was eventually sent to the medical wing of the Nemesis as he dropped violently to the floor clutching his head with roaring agony. With his Communications Officer out of commission, Megatron was finding out the hard way yet again how the organic insects called 'humans' were getting more dangerous to be left around to live. These humans that had the ability to create such a program that resisted Decepticon Intel sabotage were a true threat. There was no way this matter was going to be left alone.

Starscream was mysteriously absent. Not that the leader cared; most likely the Seeker was figuring out how to overthrow him again since one of his loyal members was out of commission.

It was clear that one of the hackers was Steve Knight, but with the fleshling in the hands of the Autobots there was a minimum chance of abducting him. Megatron was certain that Prime would protect the insect at all costs. That simply left the chance of acquiring the remaining hacker that was missing. From Soundwave's previous report and as well as Laserbeak's findings, there wasn't any relevant or sufficient information on who the other hacker was only that during Laserbeak's recon that the hacker was active.

Glaring at the remaining communications bot in the room, Sonarlock, Megatron decided that a search and as well as a hostage was going to be needed if they were to eliminate the threat. There were already a few Decepticons that were still on Earth and hiding. "Sonarlock, any luck in accessing the servers of the US Military?"

"Negative, my Lord," Sonarlock panicked but still kept searching furiously to avoid his leader's wrath. "However, I've managed to access the public terminal of the fleshlings for further information on Steve Knight." The bot only hoped he attained the information to keep himself intact, better than the other idiots who were now in pieces on the floor.

Megatron was disappointed more, "Any specific information on the insect's family?"

Sonarlock checked with fright what remained on the general human public files, "Negative, my Lord! Other information is classified by the fleshling government. For now the restricted areas were indeed blocked off courtesy of the fleshling's current program firewall."

"Immediate family units?" Megatron pushed further.

"Parent units and another sibling unit confirmed offline –," Sonarlock reported to his superior in an instant, he quickly told the only news that was good in fear of being ripped to pieces. "However there is one remaining family unit online." The bot wasted no time in extending information on the large screen of the command room.

Seeing the information on the screen the Decepticon made his decision that this threat had to be dealt with immediately. "Call all Decepticons who are hiding on Earth on our next mission. We need the perfect hostage so the Autobots will surrender their charge," Megatron ordered. "Find the fleshling's twin, Skyler Knight!"

* * *

_Medical Wing, Nevada NEST Base…_

_Later on…_

Sitting on a bed in an infirmary room, Steve was more than annoyed that he knocked himself out for more than two hours.

_Two freaking hours!_

That certainly wasn't a good thing. There were some cases that his photographic memory really messed with his head. Yet fainting and knocking him out like that was certainly the first. Things weren't helping as he had many visitors in the room at this moment, all wanting to know or at least have some sort of explanation from him about the _Lazaros._

Steve wasn't surprised at all, since after the hack was finished, his creation program logged itself out of the Intel server and disappeared without a trace. Many of the signal, code, and server analysts who were in the main hanger weren't too happy about the instant disappearance of the infamous _Lazaros_ A.I. from their servers without a chance for them to get their hands on it. The hacker guessed they would demand it from him soon.

It was quite an audience as Sam, Will, Epps, Simmons, John Keller and the Autobots in holoform (Optimus, Jazz, Prowl, Ratchet, and Sideswipe) were here to talk to him. The hacker was pretty sure more people would have wanted to see him, but he guessed the doctors limited the amount of people in the room as it wasn't exactly that large.

The questions he was asked, were basically like when did he make the _Lazaros_, is it dangerous to other servers and so forth. Yet he knew better the real question that Steve wanted to avoid was going to come soon.

"Steve, I really don't want to force you – but it's really important. We need to know who your partner was in the _Lazaros_," Major Lennox said trying his best to convince Steve. "We need to get to him somehow. I'd bet that the Decepticons are going to hunt him or find him by any means possible."

While the humans didn't notice anything, the Autobots were slightly shocked that Steve's heartbeat skipped a beat despite that his face was calm.

"What would you do if you got your hands on him?" Steve asked cautiously.

Optimus predicted that the hacker wasn't going to give up the information easily, "As you requested from us I will promise that the both of you will be under our protection and be treated as civilians. As for countermeasures, I will appoint Sideswipe to be your guardian."

Steve blinked, "Sideswipe as my guardian? You mean like a bodyguard?"

"Yes, just Bumblebee is Sam's guardian," the Prime replied.

The hacker felt his insides churn, he still had a debt to pay for the mech and now he was a bodyguard for him. From the looks from the whole room, he had a feeling that they were not going to quit before they got an answer out of him. Steve sighed, "How good are you at finding people?"

Simmons snapped, "Kid, we have people from the NSA and other Intel organizations!"

"Oh?" Steve said wryly. "You haven't even found my twin yet. I think I remember saying I'd help you guys after you came up with information that he was somewhere safe or at least found."

"We're searching for him, Steve," Jazz said quickly pleading leaving Simmons to calm down reluctantly. "You've got to trust us with this, because now that person's life is in danger with the 'Cons. They're not the type for mercy."

Prowl wasn't all that accepting of the human unlike the other Autobots, the human was probably thinking it was better if they didn't know of his partner. The hacker was making things run more unpredictably than before. The strategist kept quiet as it was better not to give any more reasons for the human for revenge in a form of the next prank.

Sideswipe on the other hand was wondering why Steve was defiantly not giving them the information on his hacker partner to them. On many accounts, he knew just how well Steve worked when he helped them on the code-breaking and even was a good team player in a prank. So why was he being difficult now? Sides had a feeling he was protecting something very important to him.

The Sec. Def. heaved a breath and looked at the young man intently, "Son – I'll be honest with you. Never in my whole entire military career have I seen anyone, and I mean _anyone_ come close to achieving you and your partner have." The old soldier smiled, "Not only you have created a program that surpassed or is at least on par with alien technology, but you've revolutionized ways on how hacking may be stopped or interfered with completely before they do damage." He paused as Steve was surprised at his compliments.

"Glen and Maggie are the best in their respective fields," Keller stated, "By that account, I swear that both you and your partner will be treated equally and respectfully allowed to what you do best. The Autobots are also willing to vouch for you should there be other people who want you for other things that should be held against you."

"Is that your promise as the Sec. Def.?" Steve asked for a real conformation.

"Yes," John said sternly.

To everyone's dismay, Steve didn't flinch or gave signs of speaking out the information they were looking for. Instead he looked at Sideswipe, "You're okay with being my bodyguard? I still owe you when you saved me back at Kansas City."

"I volunteered," the young warrior mech said earnestly. "I didn't mean to separate you from your twin. It might sound foolish, but I think I owe your twin who might still be searching for you."

Steve sighed, "You don't owe him anything, Sides. Besides all that, I'll accept you as my guardian." He looked to all the others silently as if he was still wondering if he was going to cause his twin a lot more trouble if Skyler was on the run.

Sam seeing that all the adults weren't exactly happy with the fact they still had no information about the other hacker decided to step in. Optimus was giving out many feelings of discomfort through their bond: worry, curiousness, protectiveness and a pressing matter that needed to be dealt with. Being the youngest of the group, he understood that Steve was doing what he could to keep whoever had been his partner unknown.

"Steve, if you're really trying to protect your partner, I wouldn't understand why you're going so far," Sam commented. "But – if you're willing to go that far in not saying who it is, he's really important to you." He then breathed out, "You know what? If you can tell us who he is, then I promise you he's more than welcome to have the protection of the Autobots as any NEST personnel. Including protection against people like Director Galloway, we're truly worried about the people _he_ might send instead of the 'Cons." Sam pointed out, "Sometimes our human enemies are worse than the Decepticons."

Steve winced when he heard his previous interrogator's name. _Crap, I forgot about him!_ It was a lose situation that ended up with Skyler probably hunted by everyone, but if his twin complied then at least he had the support of the Sec. Def. and as well as the NEST team.

"Fine –" Steve finally gave in to the situation with serious reluctance on his part. Unlike the others, Sam made the best valid point. "I'll agree – I swear I'm breaking many promises to him," his voice was sour like he hated himself for it.

"Who's your partner?" Sam asked again.

Steve was eerily silent as his eyes were gazing them all sharply, a sign that Ratchet had seen in many humans when they were trying to protect something close as kin. He had seen this look before in how Sarah Lennox and even the Major were protective of their daughter.

"My partner is my twin, Skyler."

Ratchet was somewhat not surprised with the fact as this human was defending what immediate family he had left. Not to mention the other was his twin, Sideswipe was probably just as protective when it came to his brother, but usually the elder was fiercely more protective than the younger. So, even if they did find out where Skyler was, would he go willingly with them? The CMO had his doubts, especially when his twin was abducted while Skyler had been searching for him.

"How do we know that he is your hacker partner, kid?" Simmons asked. "I don't mean to be a team breaker here, but for all we know you could make it as a cover for your real partner."

"Because our usernames have our names on it," Steve snapped at the man feeling insulted that after he'd given the info. "Try using your logic on it."

At the word 'logic', Prowl did an immediate search on _RecordatioFurtaCorona2__**. **_"You've used Latin names, _RecordatioFurtaCorona2_meaning in order would be record/memorize, deceit, crown and simply the number two."

Jazz found out the answer before the others, "The name Steve means crown."

"Pretty much," the hacker shrugged still pissed off at Simmons's speech before.

"Then _PhilologusFurtaIndicium1 _would be scholar, deceit, information/data and the number 1," Ratchet deducted the other username. "Skyler does mean scholar. It fits; the boy speaks the truth."

Prowl then added up all the facts on what had happened in Kansas City during the hostage situation. "Optimus, sir? Then during the incident with the hackers; we've missed him completely. It's clear he was there, there's no way to hack into an entire building surveillance system unless he was able to override it while in one of the main buildings."

The Prime nodded grimly, "The situation now is that we have no information on where he has disappeared to." Optimus asked Steve carefully, "Do you have any idea where he would be?"

Steve shook his head, "I'm not sure right now. My brother's way more cautious than I am or you could say he's a bit paranoid about things. I wouldn't be surprised if he's lying low but still trying to find me."

"Paranoid?" the Sec. Def. asked.

"It kind of runs in the family," Steve said as it was a norm. He figured that his uncle wasn't going to escape from getting his government work being found out, but the hacker by all accounts kept any information about his con family to himself.

"About your legal guardian, you said he's your Uncle and that he worked as a government agent," Will mentioned. "Is there a way we're allowed to know about him? I think it's about time we talked to him or at least try contacting him."

The hacker looked to John Keller, "That's your call Sec. Def., sir. You have the power for the clearance."

"Alright, I'll arrange he gets full clearance," Keller agreed. "Who is your uncle?"

"FBI Agent Robert Bobby Knight, he's part of the 15th Ops division," Steve stated clearly. He commented, "He's kind of the one who's responsible for making my twin be a little paranoid."

Epps raised a brow, "An Ops division in the FBI?"

"It's a new type of SWAT team, only the agents in the ops do infiltration work in the information trade business. Includes illegal arms trading, drugs, and dangerous people like the mafia guys," the hacker explained. He paused for a moment. "That stuff is confidential and not in my place to say." He then sighed, "I'm not sure if Uncle Robert is on a mission or not, but at times he's working around with the other feds like the NSA and CIA but not exactly often."

Will nodded at that, "That explains the paranoid part. He would be an edgy person when he's used to doing double agent work. But where does your twin fit in this?"

Steve obviously didn't look like he wanted to explain it but he told them, "After Mission City, my uncle didn't take my dad's death so well. He sort of made sure we'd to be able to take care of ourselves; including teaching us how to spot people with… bad intentions."

"That's not really going to make our searching job any easier," Jazz mumbled knowing how easily it could turn for the worst. His holoform scratched his head. "I'd suggest we approach Steve's uncle first, I don't think he's the type of person we want to worry about Steve or mistake us as the bad guys."

Keller agreed, "Indeed. Major Lennox and Sergeant Epps, if you would, please get in contact and if possible meet Robert Knight in person." He looked to the Autobot saboteur, "Jazz, I want you and Ironhide to go with them for safety."

"Yes, sir," the three complied.

Prowl cut in the conversation as there was another main problem was still at hand, "Soundwave will not be attacking our servers for this moment. However, there is still a chance he will attack again. Is there a possibility to upgrade the _Lazaros_ for now?"

Optimus was surprised by his second command's worry, "What seems to be the matter, Prowl? Would any of our shield servers be just as sufficient for the time being?"

"No, Sir. At least that's what Wheeljack says," Prowl said. "Communications signals of Cybertronian encryptions work differently, thus when our encryptions were online through the humans' technology they reacted differently than they were supposed to."

"Can we talk normal, and not Star Trek?" Epps pointed out as he was confused where this was going.

Simmons smiled as he explained it, "Simple, what Prowl means is that Cybertronian encryption isn't compatible with human technology. It's like installing modern software on an ancient computer. It's the reason why the firewall or Intel shields by the Autobots aren't working well on our servers. You'll see it work but with minimum results."

"It's not possible," the hacker said making everyone in the room uneasy.

"What?" Simmons exclaimed. "You can't upgrade it?"

"Not without Skyler around," Steve said seriously.

"Why?" Will asked.

"It's because when we made it, Skyler was in charge of the main encryption coding and I was responsible in making how the _Lazaros_ worked." Steve was frustrated, he wiped his face and heaved, "The _Lazaros _was meant to be made for two people to fully activate and upgrade it. Besides, the _Lazaros_ _cannot_ be hacked."

Prowl was disbelieving this, "Are you saying that even Soundwave could _not_ hack it?"

"I'm guessing he did _try_ to but he wasn't successful. It's probably the reason why he had attacked your servers today," Steve stated trying to encourage the people around him. "Soundwave most likely wanted to make sure that Skyler and I were found out somehow since he wasn't able to hack the _Lazaros_."

Sam piped in his question, "How can it _not_ be hacked?" He'd seen the bots do lots of cool, awesome things, but to him it was just so bizarre that human technology was able to go against Cybertronian tech and manage to make a stand.

"Well, for the simpler terms – The _Lazaros_ is an A.I., not your regular application program. If it detects that it's being threatened it retreats into the world internet systems or any sort of wireless connection leading to it. Even if you had it on a separate quarantined server it shuts the whole server down, but when you reboot the Lazaros gets back to the main internet system in whichever way it can." Steve said as clearly as he could. "Its making _was_ inspired by a previous program."

_More precisely the A.I. called the Grecko Player Tracker._ Nonetheless, the con man wasn't going to tell them that. His hacker and tech mentor, Uncle Roman Nagel had taught them previously that it was a creation of his school 'friend' although there was plenty of spite he said through his words in his usual thick British accent with a dash of sarcasm:

'_It was created by a school mate of mine, Grecko Montgomery. The pompous a** named it after himself.'_

Steve remembered clearly what Uncle Nagel quoted about the A.I. that forever made the motivational burst for Skyler and him to make steps in making the _Lazaros._

'_It _can't_ be hacked. And… It has one HELL of a Brain. It doesn't just Think, it __**Reasons**__.'_

Ironically, the A.I. was configured to track down players who were cheating in a casino by reading every permutation through heart rate, to body temperature, and even pupil dilation. Steve seriously doubted the military found any use in that back then.

Simmons was now more than impressed. "Kid, it sounds really unbelievable but this exists. So how come no one in the military or even in the NSA ever heard about this previous special program?" Heck, he was curious as to why in his time in Sector Seven he never had heard of it.

The hacker shrugged, "Because the previous program or A.I. wasn't military, government or even educational funded. It was private funded." _By a very disturbingly hungry gluttonous hotel casino owner, Willy Bank. _The guy was so obsessed with the Five Diamond Award (Award for world prestigious hotels), add in the other hotels he owned before that, and he was probably the best sort of person at having access to better security than the military could ever pay for.

Just as Simmons was going to ask more, a cell phone rang in the room.

"I'm sorry, it's mine," Sec. Def. Keller said. There was a short conversation on the phone which made everyone silent. "Yes, sir. There are some explanations that will be cleared. Of course, I'll be on my way." He pressed the close button on his cell. "Simmons and Sam, please come with me. We're going to meet the President. He's wanting to hear the reports on our defense ASAP."

The ex-agent nodded quickly, "Right." He was disappointed not to hear anymore from the hacker, but all the same the President was his top priority for now. "Sit tight here, kid. We're going to have to fix the mess this hack's caused. You aren't going anywhere yet."

Steve wasn't surprised at all. "I didn't think I would be."

"Will, Epps, and Jazz," Keller reminded, "I want you to start finding Robert Knight now. If you can, get information on Skyler as well." Both the Major and Sergeant exited the door quickly as Jazz's holoform disappeared into thin air. "Optimus, I wish for you to be on standby at the communications center. There is a chance the President will wish to speak with you."

"Of course, John," the Prime agreed that he would need backup. Knowing the man probably wanted more information on the hack, the Autobot leader patted Prowl's holoform on the shoulder, "Prowl, I want you to analyze anything we have on the hack today with Wheeljack. See what other parameters you can find." And with that Prowl's holoform disappeared.

"Thank you, Prime," the Sec. Def. said. This time his attention was on Steve, "We'll do what we can to find your brother, and by the law vouch for your safety. If there's any other information you could share with us, then please do."

"Yes sir," Steve said. "But if it's alright with you, I'd rather rest a while. My head's a bit nauseous with all the codes."

"Very well, perhaps tomorrow," Keller nodded to them all. "Till then."

In the end, Sam, Simmons and Keller went to their sudden meeting with the President. Ratchet later left for the med-bay as he had other things to do with Jolt. The CMO was confident after a brief scan on Steve, (much to Steve's discomfort) that the human doctors could take care of it.

All was left in the room was now the Prime, Sideswipe and Steve. For the majority of Steve's whole explanation, the young warrior mech had been silent all along as he couldn't help but feel guilty that his taking Steve perhaps had made the situation worse when it came to the human's elder twin. Thanks to the Prime's encouragement and as well as the conversation they held privately, the warrior was more than eager to make up for it.

"Steve? Is it alright if I asked you some private questions?" Optimus questioned all of a sudden.

Steve shrugged, "I guess it depends on what you're asking."

"I was wondering about how you managed to insert so many codes that I have noticed do not repeat in a sequence," the Prime said. "If I am correct you've inserted more than five thousand characters without a _single_ mistake and _very_ quickly."

"That's not possible for a normal human…" Sideswipe mumbled but looked at his human charge with shock. He just realized it!

The con man cursed himself at how alien robots were so perceptive, "Damn – What's this got to do with anything?"

Knowing the human hacker was being defensive again; Optimus replied calmly, "Ratchet was worried about your health. When you were unconscious, my CMO noted that your brain was under severe stress."

Steve sighed as he knew it wasn't wise to hide a condition that lead to health problems. He didn't like sharing his ability to remember things far too well with others. Yet the warrior mech and all the other humans around the Autobot Commander did have faith in Optimus Prime.

"Can you promise me you won't tell anyone about this besides Ratchet?"

"Do not worry, Will, Epps, and Sam have proven themselves many times over as our most loyal allies," Optimus assured. "If you wish, they are the best people you can talk with for human problems."

"Alright then, no one knows of this except for Sam, Major Lennox, Sergeant Epps, and Ratchet," Steve finalized knowing that Autobots would have a very few trusted humans with their entire secret. He already trusted Sideswipe since the mech was now his guardian.

The commander approved, "You have my word."

_Thank God, somebody like him exists._ There was little chance he'd ever meet someone like Prime on the planet.

"Well – I-I have a condition that many people don't have," Steve started off uncomfortably as few people knew about his 'talent'. "I-I can… remember things – without intending to."

Sideswipe looked perplexed. "Remembering _without_ intending to?"

"Is there such a term for your condition among humans?" Optimus frowned.

"Eidetic memory for the fancy word, and the common term is photographic memory," the youth said.

"An ability to remember anything by just looking!" the warrior mech gasped as he found the information through an internet reference. "That's really impressive for a human; I didn't think humans were capable of it." Sideswipe really meant it; humans didn't have processors or memory as acute as Cybertronians did.

The Prime nodded as he looked upon the probability of humans having such a condition. He wasn't surprised that it was extremely rare. "Does your twin have this ability as well?"

"No," the hacker disagreed. "We may be identical twins, but we're different in other ways. Photographic memory is useful, but there's a catch."

"I see," Prime understood about it as even Sideswipe and Sunstreaker were nearly polar opposites of each other. "Do you mean there are consequences?"

"Yeah," Steve sighed. "Just a _glimpse_ – and I _can't_ forget… at all." A pause. "Some memories I prefer to forget – at least partially – I can't forget them. Worse, the bad ones too; I can see them so vividly in great detail it's like I'm there." The youth looked away from the holoform Autobots, "I'm sorry if I avoided most of you guys like a plague during the first days of my stay. I needed time to adjust to your size, even during the time I was away from you all it was difficult for me to get used to it. Even if I hung out in the mess hall mostly, to my mind you're like in front of me."

"We understand. At least we know now," Prime said surprised and concerned as he heard the information of the human's condition. He would have to be careful about the hacker's condition in the future.

"Is it your first time you've fainted like this, Steve?" Sides asked his charge's condition. It was crucial to know about Steve now.

The hacker nodded, "This is probably the most extreme. Usually in other cases I'll only get a headache. Probably as long as I don't do it again I'll be fine."

"Very well, one more question before I go," Optimus told the youth. "How connected are you to Skyler?"

The youth blinked confusedly, "Huh? Excuse me?"

"It's known that twins share a connection or in our terms, a bond," the leader explained. "I've only read on my own through the human research available via the Internet that human twins are capable of knowing how the other is feeling. Is that not true?"

"Mostly," Steve nodded at the explanation. "Skyler and I are close, but I usually feel him if the emotion is strong like if he's in danger or trouble."

This time, Prime questioned specifically on when they were in Kansas City, "What did you feel when you woke the first time on base?"

Immediately, the youth's face paled, "Regret – of trying to save me. He – probably knew I was out of his reach." Nonetheless his brows scrunched up in confusion afterwards. "I don't know what happened afterward but he probably got over it. It's like he found something and he was set on finding me again."

Despite all the horrible things happening to them today, the Prime considered this as good news. He wasn't sure how strong a human twin bond was compared to a Cybertronian one, but it was a sign that Skyler was somehow doing well. Now to know of their current situation…

"Steve, what did you feel from Skyler when you were on the _Lazaros_?"

The Autobots were now more worried as they watched Steve's face had gone paler than before. "He knows I activated the _Lazaros; _I felt it, he was watching me. Skyler knows I've – f-fainted as well," Steve choked out. However his face was now contorted with intense anxiety. "I-I don't really know for sure – but I think he was angry after the hacker war."

Sideswipe wasn't sure what was going on. "Why would he be angry?"

Steve didn't want to answer the question. He really didn't, but he knew there was no avoiding it now. A heavy sigh. "Look – you know how my family died in Mission City? My brother took it awfully hard after losing our youngest sister, Scarlet. Since then he has major trust issues, and he's extremely protective of me. I don't really think it is, but –"

"He thought you that you're working for us because you had no choice or thought that you were forced to," Prime frowned gravely at the insight, which in turn the human in front of him winced and could only nod weakly. If that was the case, then Skyler was not going to work with them willingly if Major Lennox's team or any other humans who were a part of NEST unless Steve was there to convince him. Letting out Steve out of the base was too much of a high risk, not when the Decepticons found out Steve was the hacker they've all been searching for. Optimus even doubted that Sec. Def. John Keller was going to give any clearance at all to Steve about leaving the protection of NEST.

From what Sideswipe was hearing from Steve, it was a sense of longing in his spark just how similar Skyler was to his own twin, Sunstreaker. Pit, Sunny was very much the same after the Decepticons destroyed their hometown back on Cybertron. It wasn't a pleasant thought that Steve's twin was most likely to react similarly to his own twin, Sunny; it meant that there was a chance that the Decepticons could get to Skyler first because the human wouldn't trust the Autobots so easily.

"Is there a way you could try and well – make him understand through the bond?" the warrior mech asked worriedly.

"I-I'm not sure," Steve said truthfully as he held his head and laid his head down on his infirmary bed.

Knowing it was time for Steve to get more rest, the Prime said, "It is best that you get your earned rest for today. I'm sure later on Ratchet would like to check up on you. I must go, and I will do what ever I can concerning the situation with you and your brother, Steve."

Steve only acknowledged the Autobot leader with a quiet thank you as he decided he might as well rest up and sleep. He had enough to dwell on today. His head was starting to slightly throb again.

Even as the holoform of Optimus left the room, the comm. between the CO of the Autobots and the warrior was still on.

:: Sideswipe, you're officially his guardian now. :: Optimus stated the command. :: Don't blame yourself for separating him and Skyler at Kansas City, we did not know of the circumstances then. ::

:: Yes, sir. :: Sideswipe said hesitatingly. :: I just… didn't expect things would go this way. ::

:: At times things never go the way we want them to. :: the Prime said softly. :: Yet, perhaps behind all of this there is a reason why fate has done so. ::

The warrior mech couldn't agree more, :: Thank you, sir. I won't let you down. ::

:: You're welcome, Sideswipe. Keep me informed on Steve's condition every few breems. Prime out. ::

:: Sideswipe, out. ::

* * *

On a deserted section of the 70 interstate road that headed towards Denver, Skyler stood together with both his Uncle and Sunstreaker. With the darkness to aid them, this was the place where they would part. Sunstreaker now was in a black Ford sedan alt-form, very much imitating to Skyler's disguise as a government agent. His uncle on the other hand had parked his usual black Chevy SUV in front of Sunstreaker. Even if there were one or two cars that passed by it wasn't going to attract too much attention.

"So this is it, huh?" Skyler said as he knew this would be the last time he'd meet his uncle. At least until the Decepticon mess was over.

"It is," Robert nodded approvingly. "After this you're with Sunstreaker all the way." He looked to black vehicle who was the mech, "Keep your optics and scanners on my nephew, mech."

"Hmph, that's the 134th time you've said that today," Sunny grunted. Even so he wasn't going to berate the man for it.

Skyler gave a look to his uncle that seemed to be judging whether or not his uncle had suddenly become too protective of him, "_The 134__th_ _time_?"

Putting both hands on his nephew's shoulders Robert said clearly, "Whether you want to believe it or not, I'm still legally your guardian. I've got my rights to worry about you just as much as your parents did. Do what you need to do, and whatever happens we're family. Don't be shy in coming back home. Make sure you bring Steve back with you."

Skyler was now definitely startled when he was embraced with a hug from Uncle Robert. The FBI agent rarely displayed any signs of affection in front of anyone else, even in Con family gatherings. But in turn, the youth hugged his uncle back as a thanks and a gladness that his uncle was there for him. "I'll get Steve back, Uncle Robert. That's a promise, I'll do whatever it takes," Skyler said as he patted his uncle on the back.

Releasing him, Robert nodded. "Careful." He then stood and pat Sunstreaker's hood fondly, "You too, don't force yourself; especially when your 'condition' is at its worst. I don't want to lose our new family member too soon."

Sunstreaker rolled his optics, "I'm not going to disappear that soon, Robert. Take care of yourself too." He then added with an amused tone, "It'd be a shame to not continue our little rivalry."

Robert only smirked at Skyler when his nephew gaped at what he heard. "I'll keep that in mind." He walked toward his SUV, but before he got in he said to Skyler, "See you when I see you?"

That phrase immediately shut his gaping mouth, as Skyler didn't believe what he had just heard coming from his uncle. The youth couldn't help but smile as his uncle said the con family parting that they all used once a heist or job was over. In this case, it was a start of something new, and that it would be a long time before they would meet again. Skyler was now considered as part of the real con group and he had earned his place amongst them.

"See you when I see you," the younger con man said back with pride.

Sunstreaker watched as Skyler's uncle left them in the opposite direction to probably the upper states. He did say that there was a new case he was assigned to, but all the same the mech knew that he'd most likely take that same chance to make a diversion to where Skyler was heading. Now, it there was only one person left to wait for.

"When is Flipluck coming?" Sunstreaker asked slightly irked at the human's idea. He still had doubts when it came to other humans.

"In three minutes or so," Skyler said as he looked to his watch. He gave an apologetic face to the mech, "I'm sorry, Sunstreaker. I'm not trying to be irresponsible, but Uncle Robert was insistent that it's safer for Jake to take Flipluck to us here." He sighed, "It's not like I want to, but if I get caught by the security cameras again, erasing my visits from the surveillance system through hacking would be wasted for nothing."

"Fine, I'll take your uncle's word for it." The mech grumbled, "But if anything happens to the runt you're responsible for it!"

"Guilty as charged," the youth said as he held his hands in surrender. While they waited, he changed back to his normal clothes, and Sunstreaker changed to a metallic blue Toyota Camry. Once Skyler was done he had his eyes on the road. He looked around the road in hopes that the Stephans' car would soon make an appearance.

To Skyler's relief, Jake arrived in time as they he drove in his usual family car in the next few minutes. However to the youth's surprise, somehow Tiffany was excused from the hospital for two hours. The youth wasn't sure how Jake had persuaded the doctors or get the permission to do so, but both he and Nicole seemed sure to make sure that Tiffany could say her goodbye to both Skyler and Flipluck.

Tiffany was in a wheelchair, pushed by Nicole to him. "I heard from Dad, that you're leaving," she said slightly disappointed. "Why so soon?"

"There's some bad people after us," Skyler said saying the truth. "If I'm going to get Flipluck to the rest of his kind, then I have to avoid them."

Tiffany nodded at that, she understood that maybe some people would want Flipluck as an experiment than a friend.

Skyler turned to the sparkling walking beside Tiffany's wheel chair, "Had fun?"

The sparkling nodded enthusiastically, "Yup! We did all sorts of things! Played cards, games, draw, watch movies!" He then suddenly sulked. "We really have to go now? Can't we stay a bit longer?" It was clear when the small mech looked pleadingly he didn't want to leave.

"I did tell you before we won't stay for long and that we might have to leave just about any time, Flipluck," Skyler reminded. "It's for Tiffany's safety too."

Flipluck still look sullen but nodded understandingly, "Aw, okay."

"Skyler?" Tiffany asked.

"Yes, Tiffany?"

From her pocket she took out something, "This is my present for you. Flipluck has one too."

The con man looked at what was one of those homemade braided bracelets only this one was made with black leather strands. Skyler guessed she had made them while she was at hospital to keep herself busy. "What's this?"

"A friendship bracelet," Tiffany said embarrassed as her face turned a shade of pink. "I – I didn't know what to give you but Flipluck suggested that we all had one," she showed one tied on her arm.

"Looks cool," Skyler said truthfully. He didn't want to disappoint Flipluck who was looking expectantly at him to accept it and he preferred not to have an angry mech on his journey to Denver because he made the sparkling upset. "I'll accept this as a token of our friendship. Thank you. Could you tie it on my left arm?"

The girl nodded eagerly as she was happy her gift was satisfactory, "Sure!" As she tied the bracelet on his left arm she asked, "Is there ever a chance that you'll come back here one day? You're really good at teaching me those sketch techniques and making it simple to understand."

Skyler shrugged, "I'm not so sure. But – maybe if the chances allow it, I will."

With a firm knot, Tiffany smiled, "I hope we can meet again. I'll do my best to get better."

"Yeah! You have to get better!" Flipluck chirped. "Then we can play more cool games!"

Meanwhile as the conversation went on, Sunstreaker was quiet. He didn't seem to get into this sort of thing, as he wasn't exactly the social type of bot either. He always preferred to be on his own, minus the factor there were just a few bots like his own twin or Jazz, who were good at making things casual. The warrior noted how this 'friendship bracelet' was another way that humans could have a bond with one another. Seeing that the sparkling was wearing a blue one, he assumed that they considered each other as friends.

Flipluck tugged Skyler by his jeans, "Can Tiffany meet Sun?"

"Huh?" Skyler blinked._ What now?_ He wasn't so sure of this one, Sunstreaker did have a temper to boot and he didn't want to scare off Tiffany's parents. "Um, I'm not so sure." The youth looked with a noting glance he saw the car shudder a bit (not really catching anyone's attention); he wondered if it was a trick of light seeing the mech wincing at Flipluck mentioning him. Sunstreaker did seem to prefer to be left alone by other humans.

"Flipluck says you're traveling together with his caretaker," Tiffany piped up. "He keeps on mentioning his name is Sun, although I'm not sure if that's his real name."

Skyler seriously did not want to go _there_. Yet Flipluck was doing his 'sparkling pout' at him. _Oh boy._ It wasn't going to work on him (since he was a human), but it did work for the mech. Seeing as it was probably a good time for Sunstreaker to come into contact with humans and to get used to the idea of human families the con man said to Flipluck, "You're going to have to ask Sunstreaker if it's okay or not. It's his choice."

"He's here?" Skyler's mention of the caretaker perked Nicole's interest.

"Yep, but he's not exactly the social type. Sunstreaker isn't fond of nicknames, but since Flipluck calls him that and it stuck, well, that's how it is." Skyler shrugged as he heard a slight growl of the engine from the back of him and ignored it.

_Stupid son of a glitch! I'll get you for this, human!_ Sunstreaker cursed that his got the sparkling's agreement on this. His human charge wasn't serious about meeting this family altogether was he?

The humans looked interestedly as Flipluck chirped and twittered in what they figured was alien language. Surprisingly they heard a loud growl back instead. Flipluck whimpered behind Skyler's leg. Jake and Nicole looked warily at where Skyler's car was.

Tiffany frowned, "Is he okay? Is he in the car?"

Skyler was having a sense of Déjà vu like with White Eagle. Except that the mech was being unfriendly about the meeting. He forced himself not to roll his eyes and sighed, "No, he's _the_ car." The youth crossed his arms and looked to the car, "Come on Sunstreaker, you're going to interact with other humans when we get to the others. Take this as practice."

There was no reply from the 'car' to him. However there was a sound of air being vented out of the car. The Stephan family was shocked when they heard loud clicks, booms, and sounds one would guess were made by synthesizers. However from Flipluck's burst of excitement, it seemed Sunstreaker agreed. It was more shocking when the said car moved towards them.

He snorted, "I'm Sunstreaker."

Unlike her parents who weren't sure about replying, Tiffany seemed more curious than afraid. Skyler did mention that Flipluck was still a child, so she was interested what a 'parent' robot organism looked like. "I'm Tiffany. So Sunstreaker, can you change like Flipluck too?"

"Yes," the mech gruffed. Yet he made no move in transforming.

"Can you change to bi-pedal form, Sun? Pretty please?" Flipluck begged. "Really greet Tiffany properly!"

"Ugh," the mech moaned at the sparkling's request. "I'm not getting out of this one am I, Skyler?"

"Tiffany is Flipluck's friend," Skyler reminded the mech lightly. "Go on, mech."

Both Tiffany's parents were somewhat surprised on how casually he addressed the alien.

A growl from the car. "Fine, let me scan the roads first." Once the coast was clear, the mech transformed quickly into bi-pedal mode. The Stephans watched in awe as the transformation took place. It was amazing how all the pieces of metal whirled around to form a large robotic form of 15 ft. Sunstreaker made himself sure that this time around that his blades were sheathed in. He didn't want to scare them like he did with White Eagle.

The smile of Tiffany's was wide, "Wow! You look so awesome!" Her smile kept on making the mech look uncomfortable. "Flipluck was right, you really do look amazing!"

Skyler couldn't help but snigger when the warrior bot did a double take. _Poor mech, he probably didn't expect that._

The mech gave a slightly murderous glare at the human who was laughing at him and softened his facial features when he turned to Flipluck and his friend. Only it was because the sparkling had asked him so _nicely_ and had made him a promise to be quiet for tonight's journey.

"Thank you." An uncomfortable pause. "I'm not really used to meeting other humans besides Skyler," Sunstreaker said bluntly uncertain what else he could talk about to the young organic femme.

The girl smiled at the bot, "I'm kind of shy of other people too. But it's great to make some new friends. Oh – Uh – These are both my parents." Seeing the large robot nodded to both of them was enough for her to know he acknowledged them. "So other than taking care of Flipluck, why are you here?"

The mech was then interested at the small femme's courage, unlike her parents who chose to not interfere. "I'm looking for my twin brother, Sideswipe; he's here on Earth with the others. We've been separated for a long while."

"Oh, kind of like Skyler too." Tiffany said still looking at the large robot in front of her with interest. She noted parts of him that looked like swords. "Are you a soldier or something? I was wondering about the blades."

"I'm a warrior mech," Sunstreaker left it at that since he did not want to discuss anything related to the war. Sensing on his scanners the next car coming in from down the road, he quickly collapsed to his alt-form so quickly that to all the other humans it was a blur or a trick of light. "No offense, but I prefer no one else sees me in my bi-pedal form. Other humans don't take my weapons too lightly."

Jake seemed concerned about this, "I see what you mean. But why do you have weapons?"

"To protect myself," Sunny dryly said. "If it makes you feel better, we have a protocol to never harm humans under any circumstances. Good or otherwise. Why is classified."

This time Jake looked to the youth, "Skyler, would you –"

Skyler shook his head, "I'd rather not, I'll be putting your family in danger if I did."

Seeing that Skyler was sincere about it, Jake did not press the issue further.

Seeing a sign that Nicole gave to her that it was time to go back to the hospital, Tiffany sighed but she agreed anyway. "Well, it was really awesome meeting you Sunstreaker. I have to go back. Have a safe trip."

"You should get well," Sunstreaker said indifferently. It still sort of bothered the mech she kept on smiling at him. Perhaps Flipluck probably told her about him on being the way he was. _Humans are weird; especially the younglings._

There was a rather tearful separation between the two new friends, Flipluck and Tiffany. Flipluck wasn't at all familiar with separation from a friend, but thanks to Tiffany, he braved it out. Saying their goodbyes, the three left for Denver.

Tired of all the excitement in one day, Flipluck had immediately collapsed into alt-form and was recharging all the way to Sunstreaker's relief. Skyler looked at his friendship bracelet and smiled at it before his thoughts shifted now that there was no such thing as traveling causally. Oakley was the last place for that sort of thing. Now it was all about the Intel war, everything about making sure they weren't detected, to hunt down any Decepticons that were following them.

"How long are we staying in Denver?" Sunstreaker asked, getting back to their real situation.

"No more than three days," Skyler said his tone now serious. "It's the Drifter rule, or if we're really in a tight spot, only a night. If it's far too dangerous we keep moving until we find a safe place to stay and move again." He sighed, "Three days is more than enough to catch all the info in town and make a move to a different place before they track us down."

"Fair enough," the mech said. "I'd rather not catch the attention of the 'Cons either. Staying in one place too long and we'll end up being spotted easily."

"How long till we get to Denver?"

Sunstreaker calculated it, "About 4-5 hours at this leisurely pace, I'd rather not wake up Flipluck." It maybe better not to attract attention in speeding off at inhumanly car speed at this point and he figured Skyler had been working all day without much rest. He then advised the human, "You should recharge, human. Today's events were a handful."

The con man didn't protest on that, "Okay, let me know if something comes up."

Sunny grunted as a yes. The night was silent, he followed the main roads and as well as the road signs that were pointing the right way. To his dismay while they traveled was the fact there were plenty of disgusting organic _things_ (insects) that were now sticking to his front exterior because it was at night. He'd have to endure it for a while, Sunny was actually glad he had a human with him to clean it off of him.

Four to five hours flew by quickly and soon Denver was in view. Sunstreaker lightly woke the human up so he could resume looking like he was driving. As Skyler looked to his contact list on his Blackberry in hopes to get in contact with his con family, the mech on the other hand extended his scanners to see if there was anything as a threat in the city.

_Why do I have a fragging bad feeling about this?_

To his utter horror, his scanners turned out beeping a positive which made him stop suddenly.

Feeling a sudden jolt but not enough to make him choke on his seat belt like last time the con man knew the mech found something, "What's wrong? You found something?

"Skyler?"

"Yes, Sunstreaker?" the youth answered nervously because he knew that whatever Sunstreaker detected can't be good with _that_ voice tone.

"We've got 'Con company," the mech growled.

_All color from the human's face was gone._

_For this time they have certainly hit Murphy's Jackpot._

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 3.03: We're Now the Hunted_

_On route to Denver, Colorado, US._

_  
_

_Life's starting to be a slagging scrap that's a pain in the 'aft…_

_As both Skyler and I predicted, our worst case scenario was finally here and there wasn't much to do about it but to make a run for it while we got the chance._

_To tell you the truth, I HATE running._

_I'm a proud warrior bot and running wasn't something that my programming would compute._

_Pit, running was something I considered for cowards._

_With the situation we were in; facing someone like Soundwave, we had a sparkling to take care of, and that I was a ticking time bomb to my twin… I didn't really have a choice. I mean, facing Sound'aft head on was like setting myself with a self-detonation device. Since the beginning Skyler had been right; there were too many risks involved if we made it a spotlight show. With Flipluck among us, there was another added risk. If there was any way to get through this rusty slag junk situation, we'd have to operate from the shadows._

_It was now a given that Soundwave knew of Steve being the second of the Furta Duo hackers. Steve was safe with Sideswipe but I knew for certain he'd send his lackeys to hunt down Skyler to make it into a hostage trade deal, which meant that the Autobots would be hunting down information on Skyler too._

_Again, it was a big reminder for me… that I was going against my own faction for REAL this time._

_SLAG IT._

_That didn't count the human authorities._

_DOUBLE SLAG IT._

_Well, I could complain all I wanted, but it wasn't going to help me do anything. There were at least a few good things happening on this Primus-forsaken journey. One had to do with Flipluck in our midst and as well as meeting and getting to know Skyler's uncle, Robert._

_One thing I really have given up; was the fact that our resident sparkling knew how to blackmail and even do deceiving card tricks. I seriously have no control on this as it's no doubt that the habit was a part of Skyler's con family thing. At least the human, Robert, is just as strict as Skyler when it came to teaching the runt about morals._

_Thank Primus._

_I was taken aback when it was Robert that suggested Flipluck should play with the human youngling during the hacker war and as well get the sparkling to play with someone closer to his age. In a way, the runt was learning on how to play with another youngling as well as getting Flipluck out of our main focus of Soundwave's hack attack where we needed to focus without any distractions._

_Even the human youngling by the name Tiffany seemed to admire me straight away that night although we had just met. I suppose that admiration comes from how Flipluck tells her about me. I didn't mind the attention though; just wary on if she'd try to do anything that could ruin my paint job. At least she was polite._

_Robert on the other hand, he wasn't just resourceful for the small runt but in a way I was feeling grateful he was on our side. He was going to alert and even throw a few rumors which he called 'red herrings' (stupid name for a diversion after fish, I know) in hopes it would buy us some time in heading towards Denver and Salt Lake City. It was dangerous as he was staking his job on this, and if he wasn't careful he'd be hunted down himself by the government for disloyalty or betrayal._

_Still, I trust the elder con man for a good reason, just as I trusted Skyler as my partner in crime. They were both smart and dangerous themselves in their own way. It was time to take the chance and make the Decepticons pay._

_The trip that night to Denver was a silent and quick one as we'd arrive there in the early morning with normal speed and in a different alt-form._

_And then, my scanners were going off warning me that there was something out there._

_I have a REALLY bad feeling about this._

_And my scanners just had to be right._

_We're NOT alone in Denver._

_SCRAP!_

_~ Sunny_

* * *

**TBC…**


	15. Congratulations! You've won Murphy's Jackpot! – What's with Organic Con Femmes?

  


* * *

**~ Chapter 14: Congratulations! You've won Murphy's Jackpot! – What's with Organic Con Femmes? ~**

* * *

_Con man Log Entry 3.04: Luck dives into the Trash Can_

_Denver, Colorado, US._

_So Steve finally cracks and now I'm on the lamb. It didn't actually help that Murphy was rubbing his law into my face._

_In fact, I think I've won the Murphy Jackpot Lottery._

_Let's see… I have the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, and nearly every Intel agency in the US after me already with a bounty on my head… I got Decepticons and Autobots who want me because I'm the key to half of the Lazaros._

_That was expected._

_Afterward, I get a bomb dropped in my lap._

_You're probably wondering what it is._

_A call from Keith (early in morning after I SMS-ed him), and he said that Rachel was pissed at me for not contacting her over the phone._

_I forgot about her._

_CRAP._

_She obviously wanted to know what the heck happened to me in Kansas City. Also, apparently not-so-lucky-for-me Catherine/Cathy was in Denver and when Rachel and her get together usually means some serious trouble for me. What trouble? Keeping secrets from them, not to mention I was still empty handed as far as my brother was concerned._

_Steve was nicked away by Sideswipe, remember?* _Insert cursing words here*

_So, if I wasn't careful, just say – I'm in deep trouble and they were intent in brutally interrogating me. They were both my con sisters, and when you're dealing with female con artists, BEWARE._

_If there's anything that the usual Con man should be worried about, it was to never give the opposite sex in the same field any reason to have a grudge against you. There is a reason why in the thievery world that the women are respected on equal terms. One, they're the best and least suspected by authorities when it comes to infiltration. Two, they can get away with things that men cannot do (for pride's sake and for formal situations). And lastly, they are the weakness of man himself, which is good as most marks that are conned on are the majority of the male population._

_On the other hand, there's a really scary saying that female con artists go by if there is any chance that you are stupid enough to mess with them._

_The quote goes:_

"_A woman once said that a man is like a deck of playing cards… you need:_

_A Heart to love him._

_A Diamond to marry him._

_A Club to smash his f**king head in, and_

_A Spade to bury the bastard."_

_Understand what I meant by REALLY SCARY now?_

_No wonder Uncle Rusty and the other guys married so late or – in fact – some, never married; at least when your partner is a Con artist too._

_Not that I want to offend ladies by writing this (I don't a have any objections about getting married either), but I'm just giving an extreme example on what the female Con artist would do when you piss them off to the limit. Even Uncle Robert and my cousin Linus have their own sore spots when it comes to Aunt Molly; she currently holds a strategic position in the Interpol (her work's like Uncle Robert in a way) but she won't hesitate to pull some strings if she sees her husband or son doing something __**incredibly**__ stupid._

…_And pretty much I was sure she wouldn't hesitate to do it if it came to me and Steve._

_By ALL counts, I'm intent to AVOID IT at ALL costs._

_If Steve was with me right now, I was sure he'd agreed with me too._

_I remember at one point when Aunt Molly had to pull some strings during Uncle Danny's VS the Night Fox heist because they were in a sticky situation she made sure to get Linus out of it. Linus didn't get out of it without a flattened ego out of it though. The story of 'your-mom-had-to-pull-you-out-of-the-sticky-situation-because- you-screwed-up-big-time' made it to the con family meetings for _months_afterwards. Uncle Robert pestered him over and over all those times and it was a reminder for all of us younger soon-to-be grifters that you __**don't**__ screw up on a big job. My cousin wasn't really happy about being set as an example to the con family, but, hey, he was just glad enough he didn't end up staying in jail for a couple of years._

_And if facing both my cousin Rachel AND Catherine wasn't enough… guess who we bumped into in Denver?_

_Well, 'spotted out of the blue' was more like it._

_There were TWO Decepticons in Denver patrolling the area and their communication systems were FULLY online._

_How am I going to get out of this one?_

_Not my lucky week, eh?_

_DAMN IT._

_~ Sky_

* * *

Early morning in Denver was greeted with a dingy old dusty garage in what seemed to be the rougher side of the city where English wasn't exactly the first language you would hear in the streets. Rather, it was more of an ethnic settlement gathering where what the mech had heard were human who were 'Hispanic' or at least where the majority of the area population speak Spanish. It wasn't the most comfortable place Sunstreaker had been during his whole life, but he didn't like getting dust particles on him with the already dead bugs that were still on his exterior and the noise of the morning of some crazy fleshlings shouting on the streets was just plain aggravating.

Thanking Primus he was going to get his wash very soon, he watched his human charge give a can of oil to the small bumbling sparkling in their midst. Sunny could've been more demanding about their place to stay for those few hours they had rested, if they weren't in such a dire situation right now. And speaking of dangerous situations, getting _two_ Decepticons in one city was more than enough to make him tolerate his filthy exterior for what he wanted – a few more hours of safety.

With Flipluck with them now, Sunstreaker was not going to risk going into battle unless there was no way to avoid it. He might have issues if it was another normal full grown mech, but getting a sparkling into a fight was considered despicable by Cybertronian standards. The idea reminded him a bad memory when the youth sector was destroyed by the Decepticons; the only survivor they found was Bumblebee. On the other hand, there was no way around it as they had to kill those 'Cons before they leave for their next destination. Without a real full-proof plan, the Autobot guessed he'd just hide for the moment.

Still, the Decepticons wasn't the _only_ problem that their motley group was faced with.

There were a few problems that lead them to why they were staying in their place right now. The basic reason because it was the only thing available as they arrived early in the morning. It was rather difficult to get a hold of anyone since bothering organic fleshlings during their re-charge didn't get useful results (it was a Sunday or an organic's day off). However, the main reason why they were here and not with Skyler's con family was because the young con man had… 'family' problems.

"Are you going to meet Rachel after you wash me?" Sunstreaker internally rolled his optics as he was fed up with all the mumbling Skyler was doing to calm himself down.

Turning on the water, Skyler wiped over the mech's hood with a plastic cloth with a sigh getting rid of a couple of insects on it. "You _think_ I _want _to meet her?"

"Heh, you're trying miserably hard to avoid her like she's a curse, human," the mech laughingly mocked his charge.

"Of course I don't want to meet her now!" the youth exclaimed with a scowl on his face. "I'm pretty much empty handed without Steve. Not to mention, Cathy's got her back. In the most literal case, I'm going to get interrogated by both Rachel and Cathy together." Skyler snorted, "There's no way I'm letting Rachel into this crappy mess. She thinks I might change my mind from before. Having Uncle Robert know about this is more than enough."

Sunstreaker didn't understand why the human was hesitant all about this. "I don't get it, but, why are you backing off from two femmes on this?"

"They're not just two normal females, Sunstreaker," Skyler pointed out the problem. "Two female _Con Artists_; Rachel alone I can deal with, but Cathy? She has a class of her own _and_ she's a natural Roper. I wouldn't be surprised if she somehow coerced me into telling about this Intel war I'm stuck in at the moment." He sighed as he slapped his hand on his forehead. "Having _two_ of them targeting me spells disaster. It's the reason why even if the ratio in con groups that there's more men than women, they usually have a respective spot among the guys; Adam's weakness is Eve."

"That's why she was roping that big fleshy you stole from back in Louisiana?" Sunstreaker asked curiously.

Skyler blinked, "You were there when Cathy, Dexter, and I conned on the walrus guy?"

The mech snorted. "Well, I _was_ targeting you and wondering _what_ you were doing. That Dexter friend of yours seems to have a bad habit of 'fandom' for elite cars and I'd rather not have him find out about any of us Autobots."

"That's a given," Skyler laughed. The youth figured that Sunstreaker did what he could to try and plan how to kidnap him back then. In a way, he was glad he did end up being kidnapped because of the recent events with meeting Flipluck and Steve was now with Sideswipe. "How much do you know about Cathy anyway? You were following me around," he hinted.

"Not much, but I can say she's confident in what she does. She used her charm like it was nothing and sprung the trap on your target while she gave the goods to you," Sunny remembered from his memory bank and noting that also by her looks, to humans she was considered very attractive by male fleshlings. "What's a matter, human? Is she your weakness? I thought your con family rule has the 'privacy rule' you upheld so much all this time. It shouldn't be a problem to you." His charge was just stubborn when it came to these things.

A sigh came from the youth's mouth. He scratched his head while figuring out how he was going to explain it to the mech.

Flipluck being silent all this time shifted his head sideways as he listened to both his caretakers talking. Seeing Skyler looking like he was in trouble and it didn't seem like Sunstreaker understood what perhaps his other caretaker meant, he decided to suggest something. "Is it because Cathy is a sister to Skyler?"

Both of his caretakers had to their attention on the sparkling as they both forgot he was listening in.

"What makes you think that, runt?" Sunny questioned.

Flipluck shuttered his optics as he remembered it. "Umm – Tiffany said she had friends at school she said who were her sisters. Really close friends, but family!" he chirped happily. "Maybe, Sky and Cathy friends but siblings too?"

Skyler put a hand on his mouth as he chuckled. Flipluck's perceptiveness of things as well as his time with Uncle Robert somehow managed to rub off into him. "That's actually correct, Flipluck. She's my con sister. Or you could say she's already like my own sibling to me even though we're not related by blood." He then faced the mech, "In your terms Sunstreaker, she's an adopted sibling."

Sunstreaker thought of the rule, "So does that mean she's exempted from your so-called privacy rule? What happened to Rachel who's your blood cousin?"

"That just depends on the situation," Skyler noted. "Uncle Robert already had a word in not telling this alien business to Tim or Rachel, but there's a chance Linus is allowed in because he's my Uncle's son; but he's the eldest out of all of us as cousins. As for Cathy, she's a lot closer to me than Rachel when it comes into the con family thing, because she's been longer in the con heists than Rachel."

The mech took a while as he processed it. "Your relationships in a con family are confusing. The only thing my processor is telling me is that seniority in doing heists means Cathy has better rights than your cousin."

"That's what I meant," Skyler agreed at the mech's statement. "I've worked frequently with Cathy before, so I trust her and she trusts me just the same with our own secrets." Then his face turned sour, "Which… she _can_ demand from me _why_ I'm not with Steve and what the hell I'm doing right now." He then mumbled, "Lying to her is a waste of time and making her an enemy is NOT an option."

"Can't you just talk to her nicely?" the sparkling chirped up. Flipluck looked earnestly at his caretaker with worry. "Maybe you can't tell Rachel because Uncle Robert says no, but you can tell Cathy!"

"Hmph, looks like the sparkling defeated you for this one Skyler," Sunstreaker commented his charge with snigger.

Skyler gave a frown at the warrior in alt-form feeling insulted, "What? You're okay with that?" He didn't buy on what the mech was saying. "You're going to say yes about me telling Cathy?"

Sunstreaker grumbled. "Heh. Think about it, human. In _our_ situation, I think we're looking for allies, not enemies. We've got enough of those for Primus' sake!" With all the human authorities targeting them, perhaps it was wiser not to make any more human enemies because they could report on Skyler out of spite. He couldn't care less about those other fleshlings but he did care of the safety of the sparkling and his human charge's safety. A pause. "Besides, your con family is nearly an equivalent to what clans are like on Cybertron. What is their secret, _stays_ their secret."

_The mech did have a valid point there._

_Wait a sec – clans?_

"You've got clans?" Skyler asked as this was something new he learned about Cybertronians. "Do they like – uh – share sparks like you said before?"

"Nearly the same, but it's more like a personal connection server amongst each other, not an exact bond." the mech said. He then shrugged, "But they value secrecy the most. From the way I heard from you or your uncle it seems your con family meets the description."

"Makes sense," the youth agreed. Skyler breathed out, "Since Cathy's an OK then it's good with that. Still doesn't solve our problem with these Decepticons in the city."

The sparkling looked scared as he shivered in worry of both of his caretakers' safety, "You have to fight with them?" His memory of seeing Skyler fighting with his uncle back then didn't go well for him.

Skyler kneeled down to Flipluck's level, "Hey, I know you don't like the fighting, but we're doing what we can to not get caught and keep you safe. If they get to us, they'd do horrible things to us, and I can't imagine what they'd do with what we have to the other Autobots and humans."

"You have to fight because you want to protect, right?" Flipluck asked as he remembered the film he watched with his friend the day before.

Skyler was surprised at this, "Yeah. Where did you learn that Flipluck?"

"I watched a movie yesterday with Tiffany, called The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," Flipluck answered looking at the floor as if it were interesting not meeting Skyler's eyes. "So, is Sun in a war like it?"

"Yeah," Skyler sighed as he knew there was no way hiding it from Flipluck.

Sunstreaker on the other hand was clueless on what Skyler was talking about, "Lion? Witch? Wardrobe?"

"It's a classic fiction story for children. Try checking the data files on literature I gave you and search for the author by the name of C. S. Lewis." Skyler explained as he stood up to get the bucked filled with soap. "It's the story how four children were transported into another world through a wardrobe but they had to fight a large battle with the witch's army to save it."

Quickly as his human partner said C.S. Lewis Sunstreaker came up with a result, and he found the story Flipluck mentioned. "You give stories like this to younglings?" he asked incredulously.

"Believe it or not, I read that book in class in third grade," Skyler shrugged as he wasn't sure how a three year-old Cybertronian was compared to a human. "The war is mostly black and white."

"I see," the mech said. He didn't like seeing Flipluck was going to have to learn so much earlier than Bumblebee had ever done in his sparkling days, but in their situation, maybe watching that story with a human youngling made Flipluck understand the situation they were in was a good thing in a way. Still the mech didn't like that he was going to lose his innocence far too early. "What are we planning to do about them?"

Skyler looked rather annoyed as he was stumped on that one. Their previous 'Con hunt was at their advantage because they knew they had a Decepticon after them. Yet, this time around to have them driving into a city with two cons didn't bode well. The con man was worried about their communication devices being online. He was lucky enough to know that Sunstreaker was able to detect them in the city.

Something suddenly hit the con man.

_Hold on –_

_Sunstreaker was able to detect Decepticon in a range of a city?_

Seeing the human's questioning face, Sunstreaker guessed he was confused about something and it was bothering him. "Skyler? What's with the face?"

Skyler frowned. "How can you detect Decepticon signatures or specific signatures, Sunstreaker?" He paused but then he brought up a memory, "Back when we were disguising ourselves in Kansas City, Ironhide had no idea that you were there but you did through your scanners. Back in Springfield, Dreadnought was only half guessing you were the yellow Lamborghini. Otherwise he would have been in the same blind state like Ironhide." The youth breathed short in realization, "They must have scanners too, so why weren't you detected by them?"

There was a tense silence from Sunny. Having a smart human was one thing, a sharp one that had a knack to spot out the details to find it as fact was another.

"Sun okay?" Flipluck was worried why Sunstreaker was quiet for a good long while.

"Pit," the mech grumbled. "To think you'd notice it –" His voice sounded like he didn't want to explain it, but he knew that Skyler needed to know of his 'other' condition. "I'd rather not you or Flipluck hear about it, it's – not something I like to remember back when I was caught by the 'Cons."

Skyler knew what Sunstreaker had meant, and he gulped at the thought of being experimented on, because it didn't make him feel well. Add in there was a sparkling with them, he knew better than to expose the worst and gruesome parts of war on what they did to prisoners. "Alright, ignore what happened. How's it affecting you?"

"It's placed within the bond," Sunstreaker said feeling slightly grateful that Skyler knew when not to talk about war casualties in front of a sparkling. "Soundwave tampered with my bond with Sides but he didn't realize it had an advantage effect for me. I can detect other Decepticons I came into contact with on their ship, and I can somehow mess with their scanners in thinking I'm not a Cybertronian."

The con man blinked. "That's actually good news you can't be detected, and you can avoid and know who you want to hunt down." But Skyler knew that the Autobot in front of him left the aftereffects hanging. "You haven't told us about what the problem is though."

An uncomfortable shrug. "It's permanent," Sunstreaker snorted. "Hatchet might be able to fix my bond with my twin somehow, but since that ability is somehow engraved into the bond and it's a part of me. If Sides comes into contact with it, then it's going to be the same for him too."

"You're worried he might not accept it well?" Skyler asked.

The silence was a clear indication to both the con man and sparkling Sunstreaker did not like it.

Knowing that it was a sensitive issue on the mech, Skyler decided he wouldn't press further. The good news was that they had that advantage to do and go as they please without getting detected and they might have a clue to who's in the city. All he had to do now was figure out the plans to get rid of all the 'Cons in the Denver.

Flipluck on the other hand kept his optics at both his caretakers who seemed to be lost with their own thoughts. To someone as young as him he thought the idea being on an adventure was thrilling like in those cartoons that he watched but he never thought he was really brave like those people were in facing real danger. Now that he was in the character's 'shoes' Flipluck didn't feel so confident anymore. "Sun? Sky? Will I have to fight too?" The sparkling didn't like to hear his own voice capacitor was quivering.

Sunstreaker's emotions weren't readable as he was in alt-form. But from the air vented out he didn't approve of it. "Silly sparkling, I'm not letting any 'Con near you. So don't think about fighting, we'll handle that."

The sparkling didn't seem to be motivated by Sunny's statement, instead he moped. "But can't I help? I don't want to be useless… even if it's a little."

The mech didn't like where this was going, and just as he was about to get angry at the notion of Flipluck joining in – he felt a hand on his alt-form. Skyler seemed to look at him in a manner that said that he was going to take care of it. Sunstreaker only sighed in contempt and let the human do the talking. He knew he was never the right sort of bot to handle these situations as he was a natural sociopath. The only reason he could stand Skyler was the fact he was patient and talked only about what's important without prying into privacy too much. So he watched what the human was going to do next.

Skyler grabbed a small stool and as he washed Sunstreaker's underside with soap he ushered Flipluck to come over and take a seat on the other stool that was unoccupied. Flipluck immediately came over and sat seeing what his human caretaker would like to say. The con man gave the small sparkling a brief shoulder hug and said lightly, "In con family, there's _no one_ who's useless. You have your own worth and role. Okay, Flipluck?"

Flipluck pouted, "But I don't know what my role is. How do I know I'm useful?"

"Just by being who you are," Skyler pointed out pointing his finger to the sparkling's chassis where his spark was. "It's okay being a kid, you're meant to find out what you're good at. Give it time, you'll find your role. It's a part of growing up."

Tiny blue optics looked at Skyler with confusion, "Why?"

"Because," Skyler said as he wiped off more small insects of the mech's exterior. "You need to find out what you're good at, what you're not good at, what you like doing, what you don't like doing, etc. Start small and learn a bit of everything, and see what you can handle." He then smiled, "You might find something you never expected, and you'll find out what your role is, and what you want to be."

"Was it the same way for you?" the small mech asked inquisitively.

Skyler chuckled, "Pretty much the same. I learned what I could, took whatever lesson I liked doing and ended wanting to become a detail man. I have other things I like doing like painting for arts and hacking for technology." Giving a small ruffle on the small mech's head he said, "Don't worry, you'll eventually find it."

Flipluck brightened up at this and was very glad that his human caretaker was understanding. His head leaned sideways, "So, what I do now?"

"How about helping me wash Sunstreaker?" Skyler offered. "It's a small role, but it's being helpful that counts."

"Ooh!" the sparkling's eyes shimmered in delight. "Okay! Okay!"

"Just don't scratch the paint," Sunstreaker gruffly commented.

Flipluck pouted.

Skyler rolled his eyes and smacked the mech's hood lightly.

"Skyler! What was THAT for?" the mech snapped. Sunny checked his hood and scanned over himself if there were any scratches to find there were none to his spark's relief.

The youth sighed, "Just give some credit to Flipluck, alright? You said it yourself we'll handle the fighting."

"Pfft, fine," Sunstreaker said indifferently. He snorted, "Go and help the human, runt."

The pout immediately disappeared as soon as he heard Sunstreaker's approval, and Flipluck excitedly got a soap bucket and start helping out Skyler applying soap to the other side of his alt form.

Thinking of their main problem at the moment the mech started the conversation again, "Are you going to meet your cousin or not?"

That of course made the human in front of him tense up and stopped what he was doing. Skyler sighed, "Can't I avoid her?" He asked hopefully.

"Stop being stubborn, Skyler," Sunny said as he inwardly rolled his optics. "You said it yourself that you don't want both of those femmes to interrogate you. You should handle her first if you don't want more trouble. Having more trouble is not what we need right now – we've got two 'Cons to get rid of."

The youth was giving the mech a scornful look that said he wasn't giving up.

Sunstreaker huffed out his vents, "Fine, we'll see later on how Robert thinks of his nephew cowering behind a wall because of two femmes."

"Hey!" Skyler complained. "Don't tell me you're going into the blackmailing too!"

A loud laugh came from the Toyota Camry. "Heh, I've been doing it since I've been welcomed to the 'family'. Don't think you're immune to it." There was a triumphant tone in Sunny's voice.

"Tch. Damn it," the con man muttered. "Fine – I'll _call _her and then _meet_ her. Happy now?" Skyler was more than reluctant to do this, but he didn't want any blackmail material on him.

"Acceptable," the mech chuckled at the human.

Skyler grumbled and muttered incoherently as he applied more soap on the hood.

After the con man was done washing the mech (with the help of Flipluck), he finished up by having a quick breakfast and packed up what was outside his bags, and finally with the guts he had – made the dreaded phone call.

Skyler sighed as someone picked up the phone who he knew was his cousin, "Hello? Rachel? We need to talk."

_He was so not looking forward to meeting her._

* * *

_Why was he feeling so nervous?_

Steve was utterly confused with his feelings.

Were they his or Skyler's?

He blinked, and then shook his head.

_Whoa there Steve, time out! Time out!_

The hacker sighed in the rather deserted corridor and calmed himself down. After breathing in and out and he was certain it wasn't bothering him, Steve walked to the mess hall. A couple of soldiers who passed by would either wave at him happily or would give a nod of respect. Steve wasn't at ease about it as he wasn't used to getting that much attention, but all the same he did save those people who had their jobs on the line because of Galloway's interventions in the political grounds. The Intel people and as well as the Pentagon group like Glen and Maggie were off writing their reports.

He had to say it was also an odd morning, since Sideswipe was off on duty he had been in the company of the female Autobots or femmes with Bluestreak, Wheelie, and the minor twins. Obviously, that meant he spent time with Mikaela, Fig, and Leo.

The group wasn't all that quiet as they had Bluestreak doing all the talking and even Fig was keeping up with him, often speaking back to his mother language or Spanish. It didn't bother Steve at all because he could understand it, but he made a polite request every now and then because Mikaela was with them.

Wheelie was a small Cybertronian with an alt-form of what seemed like those toy remote cars. Nearly all the time he was trying to get Mikaela's attention if he was allowed to hump on her leg to Steve's disgust (but he chose to not comment on it anyway). Thankfully, with the threat from Chromia (being a female version of Ironhide), Wheelie shut up. Well, Steve would do the same when facing a large canon in the face. Flare Up like her name was easily swayed to join her sister energetically ready to join in shooting the small mech, but thanks to Arcee who was slightly more subtle than the rest of the triplets – made sure they didn't send Wheelie to the medic. Ratchet was having a bad mood today as Red Alert glitched again because of some security problem.

As for the smaller twins Mudflap and Skids, they were messing around with Leo. It seemed like it was their favorite pastime because Leo was very reactive no matter what they did. If anything, Steve would say Leo had a high ignorance level. All the same, the smaller twins were caring in their own way albeit more playful considering age wise they would probably be slightly younger than Bumblebee.

Steve had to say they were a really odd and _loud_ bunch together. However they mentioned they were currently at base because of the Decepticons being active they had called in all civilians or at least all who were directly linked to the people of NEST. The young hacker only briefly heard most of the families of the soldiers like Major Lennox's and Sergeant Epps' were all sent out to a NEST base at Diego Garcia which was the main NEST base in the middle of the Indian Ocean further southwest of India. Sam's parents were also known to be there as well, which made Steve wonder why he wasn't with them too. He guessed that he was here because they needed him if Skyler was ever taken in.

When the hacker got to the mess hall, there were plenty of soldiers milling about. Steve had taken his one tray share of food for lunch and quickly walked to where Mikaela's table was at. Wheelie and the other bots in holoform were mysteriously absent.

"Hey," Steve said as he hovered over, "Mind if I sit with you?"

"No, not at all," the girl said as she welcomed him to the table. "Take a seat."

The hacker nodded with thanks and sat down. Feeling hungry that noon, he ate what was on his plate quickly despite the fact that he wasn't into military food. Leo soon joined them after with Steve moving to one side so he could sit beside him. Steve noted that the soldiers were kind of edgy and were speaking in hushed tones around him.

He looked to Mikaela. In a quiet voice he asked, "Would you happen to know what's going on? Everyone seems… edgy or something."

Mikaela shrugged, "I heard Arcee and other Autobots are avoiding someone, but I'm not sure who. The news came in just an hour ago."

Leo look to the left and then to the right. He gave a signal to the two others on the table with him to come closer. "Bad news, we got another Galloway guy; except, he's a weapons inspector."

Steve blinked at that skeptically, "Weapons inspector?"

"It's not that the person has clearance for it right?" Mikaela asked knowing just how heavy the restrictions for knowing the existence of the Autobots were from her boyfriend.

The other shook his head, "Nope, but the soldiers think that he's bad news." Leo then looked at Steve worriedly. "Most likely he's here because of the Autobots aren't letting Galloway in, but also he's probably looking for you Steve."

Steve didn't comment anything on that; there was a chance people would want to get their hands on the _Lazaros._ He chose to ask something else, "How bad is it with the new guy?"

Leo sighed. "I dunno, but I bet you everything, that whatever Galloway sent, it isn't going to be good."

"Does Sam know about this?" Mikaela said anxiously.

"He does, but he's stuck in a meeting with the higher-ups and Galloway too. I'm not surprised if Galloway planned it that way." Leo said sarcastically. He knew more than enough about the liaison who would do anything to make Sam slip up somehow.

Mikaela was going to ask another pressing question, but was interrupted as the mess hall was silent and all heads were looking in the direction of the door. Just as they were talking about him, the said weapons inspector walked in with an aide of sorts. A man in his mid 30s, brown groomed hair slicked to the back, he was regal looking, wearing large round sunglasses, in a grey suit that screamed he was important. Looking around the room as he took his sunglasses off revealing grey eyes, he spotted his target.

Steve slightly cursed himself over why the man had _always_ had good eyesight on what he was looking for.

As he walked towards the hacker the soldiers were keeping an eye on how Steve was fairing. They seemed to be ready for anything if things got messy.

The hacker was thankful for the worry of the other soldiers but shook his head he'd try to handle what ever the weapons inspector wanted.

_Besides, this person was a familiar face. Yet, they were both bound by the rules._

"You're the second hacker are you?" the man said brightly that Steve swore his teeth would have shined if it were a television toothpaste ad, and gave his hand out. "I'm Jack Lockery, weapons inspector for NEST at the moment."

"Y-Yes," Steve answered brief as he warily took the man's hand and shook it. "Steve Knight."

The grip as they shook was twice as they both looked at each other in the eyes. _Definitely a familiar._

"Would you happen to be able to operate the _Lazaros_? It would be interesting to see how it works," the man inquiringly said in a casual tone. He was a man straight to the point.

Both Leo and Mikaela looked at Steve anxiously. From Jack's face they knew this person was hungry for any information on the weapons of the Cybertronians, and that Steve's A.I. was the key to unlocking it.

Steve shook his head. "I'm still prohibited in handling computers around base, yesterday was special case. And it's that I don't have permission to open it for the NEST team," he said impassively.

This time Jack kept on smiling, "I could arrange it if you want to, son." He took out a metallic case, and wrote something on the piece of card before he gave it to Steve. "I'm a bit on a tight schedule, here's my number. You need anything, just give me a call." Still smiling as ever and the greed going off in waves, the man took Steve's hand placed the card in it. "I think we might have a good agreement if you're up to it."

"And if I'm not interested?" Steve replied curtly with his own question.

There was a slightly malicious face on the weapons inspector, "Director Galloway and I can arrange something to _make_ you interested."

The hacker didn't back off, it was Fig that stepped in, "Sir, there's a call for you at the main office. It's the Director, Sir."

His expression immediately changed to his regal stature, "Of course. Thank you, soldier." Jack looked at Steve again, "Remember, the offer still stands." With a small wave he exited the mess hall quickly with his aide. As soon as he left the soldiers went back murmuring on what just happened.

"Are you okay, buddy?" Fig asked.

Steve nodded to Fig, "For now it's not a big deal. I can't say for later though."

Leo agreed to that, "You got what he said? He said he'd 'make' you interested. Sam's got to know about this!"

"I'll tell him," Mikaela volunteered. She then looked at Steve, "I think you should avoid him or stick to Sideswipe while he's at base."

"Yeah," Steve agreed with them. He turned around and quickly used a card trick skill.

Unknown to Fig or the others, Steve carefully slid the card together, showing there were two cards stuck together instead of one. The hacker rolled his eyes rapidly as he knew it was the cheapest and most effective trick for a short message. He was glad enough everyone else wasn't extremely observant. He blinked at the message:

**~ Meet me at 1pm in W room. ~**

As soon as he read it, Steve wasted no time in sliding up the cards, sealed them together and looked around for an ashtray. "Here's one." He then said aloud to the soldiers nearby him, "Anyone got a lighter?"

The one table of heavy smokers volunteered immediately and Steve got himself a metal lighter.

Finally burning them on an ashtray, he got rid of the evidence. No one saw he had two cards but everyone who saw him burn the Director's assistant's name card from afar seemed to clap at him or gave him thumbs up. Steve sat there contemplating how he was going to meet Jack without the others knowing. It was Leo who came over to him and had a questioning look.

"Are you making sure the thing is turning to ashes?" Leo asked.

Steve gave him blank look, and shrugged. "I'd prefer not to have his number around with me. It's not like I have a cell phone or anything around the base."

"Good point."

Mikaela was happy that Steve was on their side but she still wasn't sure if burning his name card was enough. "It's not like it's going to help in stopping him from coming after you."

"Still, I'm happier not carrying it around with me," Steve noted. "It's not that it's got any use –"

Steve blinked as he touched and felt a tinge of pain on his left cheek.

Mikaela frowned, "What's wrong Steve?"

"I don't know – it feels like…"

* * *

_Denver, Colorado…_

'_**SLAP!'**_

_Getting slapped by a crying girl._

_Way to go on being the heartless bastard, Skyler._

_And DAMN… that HURT._

If getting hit by a hard slap wasn't enough, Skyler hissed in pain as this was the second time he got slapped on the face on the _same _side.

"I _HATE_ you," Rachel said bitterly and without giving him a chance to say anything, she left walking out of the garage.

Left in the room Cathy gave Skyler a good stern glare she was going to interrogate him senseless and said, "I _will_ hear _everything_ from YOU later." Then she walked out to chase Skyler's cousin as she mumbled about why some men are so dense when it came to women's feelings sometimes with a huff.

Skyler rolled his eyes. He was fed up at all the pestering done by Rachel he used one of the rules in the 'code' on Rachel that she had no way of knowing what he was up to now. The con man was just as hurt to use it against her and it may make him look like a heartless person, but he did have orders from his uncle and by no way he was going to break it to Rachel. Knowing how Rachel would have reacted, Skyler let his cousin slap him. She did deserve some sort of lashing at him on her part.

As he kept on massaging at his burning cheek, small towel flew to his face softly. Skyler blinked and brushed the thrown wet towel off his face and turned to see a familiar face, but a face he hadn't seen perhaps over a year or so.

"Darlita?" the hacker asked surprised she was here.

"Yup." A red head girl said. She held him a rectangular ice pack. "Here, Cathy said you'll need this for your cheek."

The hacker wasn't expecting the 22 year old in these parts. Not a really tall girl that had tanned skin (probably going to the beach too often), with red short choppy hair with green eyes and freckles on her face. Darlita was the only female explosives/demolitions expert in his generation; but why she was here made him curious. As far as he knew, she usually stayed at San Francisco in the Bay area.

Skyler accepted the icepack and eyed it skeptically, "Cathy did?"

The girl rolled her eyes, "Please, just because she doesn't agree with what you did; it doesn't mean she doesn't care about you." Darlita sat down on the bench that Skyler sat on. "I heard bits of the fight. You used the 'all or nothing' _code_ that even Cathy couldn't interfere with, didn't you?"

Feeling relief of the cold on his cheek he nodded. Skyler was sure his cousin deliberately widened her hand to make the slap more painful. Larger surface area equals more pain. "I had to. I'm in really deep shit right now. Rachel cannot get into it. Way to dangerous."

"You want to talk about it?" the red head girl asked.

The con man gave her a dubious look.

Darlita only laughed instead, "Suppose not. I'm forgetting guys don't 'talk about it' like girls do." She sighed, "Well, don't get all angry on me, alright, Sky? I'm not in a good mood myself really because of things happening recently, but I won't butt in too deep if you want it as a secret. I'm here to get my frustration out in a quieter place."

"And you chose the kitchen?" Skyler asked awkwardly.

The female demolitions expert nodded, "Being here beats with going around with the girls who are probably babbling about cursing you or conning you back. Plus the guys are locking up the meeting room for the next con." A growl escaped her lips. "And I came all the way here for nothing."

"Don't tell me," the con man started, "You got nothing to blow up."

Darlita looked at Skyler with astonishment, "Darn it – you're getting sharper than last year."

This time it was Skyler's turn to roll his eyes, "Come on Lita, you've been lighting up anything that blows like Chinese firecrackers from Uncle Yen as a habit since we were in primary school. I was wondering why you were here. You usually don't come to these parts."

"Like you," Darlita nodded, "I've been drifting for two months since I'm on vacation. I still got another month before I get called into real work again. But since the job's done and everything, I'm heading back the day after tomorrow."

"Work with Keith?" Skyler asked. "You got paid fairly for it, right?"

"Yeah, but my stuff wasn't needed in the end," the girl said disappointedly. "I'm not sure what to do with the extra batch of explosives I have. I can't just blow them up for fun."

Skyler thought of his current situation, and thought that perhaps a good amount of explosives could help with his Decepticon problem. However, considering this was Darlita's explosives he needed her to do the blowing up procedures. Her explosives were more sophisticated and had designs that only she specialized at. Skyler was insistent on telling Cathy about his major problem, but now he was weighing the options how he should approach Darlita about it too. He knew handling two Decepticons with only Sunstreaker was going to be tough. Plus, help was rare in the worst situations; he might as well make take the opportunity while he had gotten lucky. It wasn't going to be every time he was in trouble he'd bump into his con family. Hopefully it wouldn't end up in a disaster.

"Funny," the young man said. "Usually blowing things up is fun for you. You could always get the goods sent back to San Francisco, your employees and co-workers could use the extra ammunition."

Darlita didn't look impressed, "What part don't you get I _want_ to get rid off them?"

"None," Skyler said dryly. "You're forgetting I'm a guy. I don't have a woman's intuition. We guys won't get what you're hinting at unless you make it clear, Lita."

Frustrated, the red head girl wiped her face and looked to her friend. "_Snake_, I _need_ to get rid of a couple sacks of explosives. Is there anything you can come up with?"

Now Skyler knew he was going to tread on this one carefully. "I do have an idea, _Fuse_; the problem is… you're going to have to get involved with the trouble I'm in."

The demolition girl noticed Skyler's seriousness on the topic as he used her Con alias back at her. She knew from that face that he was really honest about it. "How bad is it? Bad in getting into trouble with the family, the authorities, or you somehow in trouble with the government?" she asked with the last part hoping it was a joke.

"Last two you mentioned," Skyler said indifferently. He stood up and started to walk away but stopped at the door. "I'll give you time to think over it. It's really a life and death situation sort of thing. So please don't tell Rachel about this."

"Skyler?"

"Yes, Lita?" he looked back.

"Are you going to tell Cathy about your problem?" she asked hesitant. Darlita had seen Skyler being serious before, and if he really meant it then perhaps her friend was in a life and death situation that was not to be trifled with.

Skyler looked at her uneasily, "I've been planning to. I just don't know how she's going to take it. Preferably I don't want her to know on her own. Girls need someone to talk to get with their problems right?" There was a nod from his friend. "You can tell her I'll need to speak to her about it. Take your time on making your own decision though; it might really change your life completely. I'll be in the garage if you need me."

Soon, he walked over towards the garage in the small villa that was currently Keith's con group meeting place to stay when they were discussing over with their plans for heists. Skyler got a warm welcome to come and stay over, but the group was rather a bit sour with him after what happened in Springfield about his poker winnings.

When he got to the garage he was greeted by Flipluck who was waving from Sunstreaker's interior. Immediately afterward being bored, he was playing on the PSP again. The mech insisted Flipluck hid inside him during their stay in Denver.

Sunstreaker looked amusedly at the human who was holding an ice pack covered with a towel on his cheek. "So, I take it that it's over between you and your cousin?" his voice was at a mid volume to not alert anyone else in the house.

Skyler look sourly at the blue Toyota Prius alt-form and sat down on a stool that was nearby. "I got slapped in the face twice by Rachel and Cathy's eager for my interrogation."

"You have any ideas how to handle our 'Con problem?" Sunstreaker asked totally ignoring the human's misfortune. He hoped there was at least more information on it.

"Other than Cathy, I think I'll let in a friend in on this. Her name's Darlita, the girl with the red hair."

This perked the mech's interest, "What's so good about this femme and where does she stand in your con family?"

"I heard she has a problem in getting rid of extra explosives. If she agrees, we're going to get her help," Skyler explained. He gave the Autobot a reassuring look. "About where she stands, she has more seniority than both Cathy and I. While most of us were still in high school, she's been blowing things up in real cons and heists. Long story short, she's the only female demolitions expert in my generation that has the most experience."

Sunstreaker was mildly surprised, but he shrugged it off just how in Skyler's con family there was just nearly every sort of person with their own specialty. "Reasonable. But the fact that she may not agree can be a problem."

The young con man thought more on their situation. "Sunstreaker, would you happen to know which Decepticons are in Denver? You knew about Dreadnought following you."

The Autobot warrior vented out air, "That's because I fought him beforehand." A pause. "But the signature scans do work, if I'm correct the Decepticons are Mindwipe and Shriller."

"Any specific things we should watch out for, with these bots?" Skyler questioned as he was already starting to formulate plans in his head.

"Shriller like his name uses high pitched frequencies to make his enemies paralyzed for a brief moment," the Autobot described. "He's a coward, and usually hides or fights behind other 'Cons. I can easily frag him by deactivating my audio receptors. The problem is Mindwipe."

Nodding to the name, Skyler already had a hunch that he wasn't named Mindwipe for nothing. "I'm guessing Mindwipe has a special ability then?"

"It's like an overriding program for us Cybertronians, as we don't have a sub-conscious like humans," Sunstreaker hinted. "Perhaps – according to your language the best word would be 'hypnotism'."

Skyler blinked with surprised, "Whoa! And I thought I've known weirder things." He scratched his head, "From what I'm guessing Shriller's a mid to short distance attacker and Mindwipe's a short distance attacker. That's going to give us problems." Seeing the warrior mech was a front-liner, he needed to get close but without getting paralyzed and hypnotized. There was still the online communications problem too. The human then blinked as he forgot one minor problem, "Sunstreaker, what are their alt-forms?"

"Shriller's a black Mercedes sedan car," Sunny snorted with dislike. However he growled at the next 'Con mentioned. "Mindwipe's what you humans call a news copter."

_And we got ourselves a flier._

_Drat!_

_WHY does Murphy hate me?_

The youth scowled. He was fine with taking out ground Decepticons, but with some bot that can fly… this was _really_ bad. Skyler was questioning if he could snipe the 'Con down to the ground. A ground target wasn't as bad when it came to winds and such; but a flying vehicle? The calculations were different, and there was more of a chance to miss the intended target – especially small places of wiring or the connection joint of the limb that the flying bot had. Skyler did not want to waste so much of Uncle Franz's special explosive ammo early in the journey.

Just as Skyler was going to say something, he noticed Flipluck inside the mech changed into his alt-form quickly and Sunstreaker had not said a word. Hearing incoming footsteps, the con man turned his head and saw both Cathy and Darlita coming into the room.

The next thing the con man knew a punch was headed his way; but he caught it with his free hand.

Cathy was disappointed in not getting her intended target.

Skyler sighed, "Sorry, but Rachel had the right to slap me on the face." He knew better than to think Cathy was just a weak Barbie doll type of girl since she had looks that even models would kill for. That had always been her disguise and even now; the moment people fell for it they were already her victims. Her earned Con alias as 'Charm Speaker' wasn't just a nickname; it was what made her dangerous.

'Charm Speaker' wasn't fazed at all, "Lita and I wanted to talk about this mess you're stuck in. We both agreed it's best we know it together."

Skyler let Cathy's arm go but he was still on guard in case Cathy tried to do anything else. He then turned to the red head, "You sure of this? My problem might ruin your life permanently."

Green eyes met blue. Darlita nodded, "I've done my thinking on it and I do need to get my stuff used up. On the other hand, all cons and even capers are all about whether you're in till the end, or out. My decision is in, so no worries. Alrighty, Sky?"

As both girls were serious, Skyler handed them both stools. "It's going to take a while to explain everything, so you girls might as well sit down." He asked Cathy, "Where's Rachel?"

"Went out with Susan for some R&amp;R after what you've done to her," the charm speaker said accusingly of the con man.

"More like going to the bar to get some 'glug glug and Woohoo' plus a guy hunt," Darlita added.

Skyler gave out a frustrated sigh as they were seeing him as the really bad guy. "Just so you girls know, I'm _not_ happy about hurting her either. Uncle Robert made me swear not to tell her or Tim on the code. Her or her brother knowing is out of the question."

Darlita only blinked. "Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Hold on a sec! You met with Uncle Robert and he made you swear to not say anything about it to Rachel?"

"It's as serious as it gets," Skyler huffed. "Not to mention Steve's involved in it too."

Cathy looked thoughtful. "How deep in trouble are you with the authorities? And what's it got to do with Steve?" She wondered just what did Skyler do or steal that caught the attention of so many people.

"Would you two happen to remember a hacker war of two hackers that made it over the internet that blocked one hacker who was going to destroy a military Intel server?" the con man asked back.

"The Furta Duo," Cathy said knowing what had happened. She gasped as she added up the facts, "Wait – You and Steve are the hackers?"

Skyler gravely nodded. "That's right. It gets worse after that, though."

With this, both Cathy and Darlita had their full attention on Skyler.

"I know this sounds stupid," Skyler said as he scratched his head, "But…I'm being chased down because I'm a target for the government conspiracy involving aliens."

The room was quiet for five seconds…

…before it was filled with hysterical girls going into giggling fits.

_Man… I knew they wouldn't believe it. How am I going to explain it all to them properly?_ Skyler sulked.

Cathy was first to recover. She was about to add in a joke since it sounded so bizarre but cut short on it as she noticed to find Skyler's expression as one he only reserved when he was worried about Steve. From what she knew, that wasn't the type of face Skyler used when he lied. It was plain truth.

Not wasting time, Catherine tapped on Darlita's shoulder to point out that it was serious. In mutual understanding, the red head stopped and calmed down.

On cue Skyler said, "It sounds crazy, but the government's been hiding it; we're in a war in-between ETs. There's two factions, one that you can say want the human race destroyed and the other that's helping us." He breathed out a sigh. "What Steve and I made, the bad guys want it since we're a threat to their Intel. They're after me."

Charm Speaker wasn't sure where this was going, but she chose to listen more on it. "Tell us what you can tell us, Sky. We might not believe you because we don't know anything, perhaps knowing more details we'll understand and believe somehow."

"I suppose that's a ditto for me," the female demolitions expert piped in. "I'm a sucker for conspiracy theories, but I'm more than happy to know a real one. It's a candy I can't miss." Now noticing Skyler looked relived, she tugged him playfully. "Spill the beans, Snake."

That noon he told both of them where it mostly started on Earth in 2007.

Mission City.

* * *

_Nevada, NEST Base…_

Steve wasn't sure what the cause was of why his cheek burned. His twin brother was never a womanizer and he wasn't sure it was the effects of meeting a random girl on the street. He inwardly hoped that it wasn't because he got caught up by those Intel agents either. Yet, as he didn't feel any feelings of being threatened Steve guessed his twin was safe for now.

Going to the indicated room or what many may call the washroom, Steve arrived in time avoiding any Autobot or soldier as he got in. Nearly most of the soldiers were training with the bots, the rest were scattered off base doing guarding duties, including his guardian. For him, it was necessary that he handled this quietly considering that the NEST team had no idea on who Jack truly was. To his expectation, he was alone there and checked it thoroughly that it was completely empty.

_I don't like lying to the Autobots or the others, but I need my own information on the outside world._

Seconds later, Jack Lockery came in and pulled his sunglasses off.

"Didn't expect you were the hacker, _Serpent_," The weapons inspector said casually. "Not to mention _Snake's _your partner."

Steve replied, "I could say the same for you, _Vulture_. So, is being an assistant to the National Security Advisor any fun?"

Jack chuckled, "You've grown kid. If your father saw what you have done recently I'm pretty certain he's laughing plus bragging 'bout you and your brother to the other dead ones around him in his grave." His more manipulative and even hostile facade was gone from his face. "We're going to keep this meeting short, or else people might suspect something between us, and I prefer they don't."

Steve nodded at that and decided to cut to the chase. "Are you here on work? Or the double work?" _Working normally or working for the 'family'?_

"Double work," the man said with a smirk. "Galloway's a cake that one can't afford to miss. But he's an edgy one, kinda got to take it slow to get what I want. It's been challenging." Jack seemed to notice that Steve now had put his guard down as he knew they were now on familiar grounds. He was just as curious on why Steve was still here and being cooperative with the military people. "You okay here? Don't mean to barge in or anything, but when I heard you got into this mess and that Snake's a target for nearly every Intel agency in America, you got me worried."

"It's safe for now," Steve assured. "As long I stay on base. It's my brother I'm worried about."

The other nodded understandingly, "I may not look like it, but if I hear anything I'll try to let you know, kid."

However, Steve raised an eyebrow at that, "I'm assuming you want something in return? If yes, I'll be willing to let in some Intel." _A trade for a trade._

Jack could only smile at that, "You make a really helpful nephew you know that? On the better side, I'm glad that memory of yours came in handy in my lessons."

"_Dad's_ lessons," Steve corrected. Looking at his watch he asked his con uncle, "What do you want to know?"

"As you know, Galloway's wanted these weapons technology that this part of the military has been hiding. Well – that is what he tells me," Jack rolled his eyes and sighed expressively widening his hands out exaggeratingly. "I thought I could hear more of the truth from you."

"How much clearance were you given?" the hacker asked.

"As far as that this military group is concerned – I'd say the fact they fight against terrorists and are very special," the man stressed the word 'special'. "I don't know about it, but it's rather a stupid way to hide that sort of info since the guy who's the NSA can't get hold of the 'new weapons plans'. I've been in the weapons trade for years and a guy in Galloway's position usually gets what he wants. The fact he can't, smells like a cheap cover up to me."

The hacker nodded to that, "It is. He's got other plans so a couple of politicians get a boost in their profits for weapons development. But I got to say Galloway's trying to take on something bigger than he can chew."

Now seeing that Steve knew the information to the weapons the weapons inspector blinked, "You know what those weapons are?"

"Mostly, but trust me Uncle Jack, you don't want to get involved," Steve warned. "In the Con Danger Factor, this deal is really messy."

Jack wasn't buying it, "Steve, just what level are we talking here? I'm surprised by your attitude you're taking it personally."

"Triple S, or the most dangerous our type of people avoid," Steve scowled. "It is personal. I swear on the _code_ I'd rather not have you get mixed into this crap, but it happened."

"No way, I came here to do my job kid." He paused when he realized the level Steve said. "Geez, a triple S?" the man shook his head and combed his hair back in worry knowing it screamed danger and the level wasn't going to be easy to deal with. He sighed, "I really don't want to go against you kid. If not, can you tell me how it's personal to you?"

Steve decided to tell him mostly the truth, "These guys who have the technology are fighting terrorists who have the same high level technology we can't handle. I owe a life debt to one of the soldiers."

"That doesn't explain how you got it personal," Jack pointed out impatiently.

The youth sighed, "The terrorists these guys are fighting are the very ones responsible for the deaths of my parents and Scarlet back in Mission City! If Galloway disbands the team because of the whole technology issue, more people are going to be killed because he didn't know what was more important than getting more profit to some rowdy politicians."

"…Wait." Jack paused. "You're saying these guys fight the ones who killed Taylor?"

Steve nodded silently as Jack eyes turned sharper. The hacker knew all too well of that look, it was a face when a con man sparked the first drop of vengeance. He didn't blame Jack for reacting that way, because just as Steve and even Skyler had their own mentors – their father was a mentor to Jack in the same way. His 'uncle' that was younger than his other uncles had admired his father to the point he had considered his father as an older brother.

The man shook his head in not believing it. To be precise, Taylor had considered him as his number one protégé. And when he died, so did all his hopes of getting the approval of Taylor that he was his next successor. At least until Skyler was then proved worthy to step into Taylor's place. Jack was now seeing why it was personal, and perhaps he'd better plan over on what he was going to do after knowing this information.

Jack was now thoughtful, "Well – that certainly changes things." His eyes narrowed to Steve, "You probably know I want those guys dead for what they did to Taylor, the fact I'm working against what I'm supposed to be doing is a problem. I can't back off from this job."

"Then keep the job," Steve supported his uncle. "We'll just have to make it look convincing that we're on opposite sides. Besides, you probably had made promises to Galloway you never intended to keep."

His uncle smirked, "Well you know what _my_ kind say."

"In Greed We Trust," Steve quoted off what _lobbyist grifters _pledge was/is. "I don't want to think I'm ever going there and join _your_ kind." They were still con artists, minus the stealing and more elite lobbying. Elite – like parliamentary officials, governors, and in some rare cases superstars.

Jack laughed lightly, "You don't need to kid, there's more of your generation coming in soon. You're better at what Danny and Rusty does. Lobbyist Grifters do need stolen info now and then which is where hackers come in." Then his face turned serious, "So, what will it be?"

"I'd rather avoid any clearance problems," Steve noted. "I can generally tell you about a few of the personnel around the base are like and what they are doing generally. Or at least the ones you're interested with. In turn, you warn me if Galloway decides to jump the gun and if you ever meet Skyler, say to him I'm doing this on my own will."

"Deal," the lobbyist nodded as he took out his hand for a shake, "I'm swearing on the code for this."

Steve took his uncle's hand and shook it, "It's on the code." A pause. "What's your first task on the base anyway?"

"Recruiting you, actually," Jack smiled knowing he'd be going against his mentor's son. "Am I going to expect a good lashing from you?"

The youth rolled his eyes, "I think that's pretty obvious; the challenge is on." He then thought of an important factor, "By the way, I got a very protective bodyguard that I'm assigned to. I'm warning you a he has a bad temper, it can get dangerous if you push it over too much. NSA assistant or not."

"I'll keep that in mind," Jack said noting that detail. Looking to his watch he sighed knowing he had another meeting. "I gotta go, nice talking to you, kid. Take care of yourself, we're gonna have to make the show a little more lively after this." He smiled in the thought his job wasn't going to be boring than initially was.

"Later, Vulture."

"You as well, Serpent."

Steve waited more than a few seconds as Jack left the toilet. As Jack headed towards the left that headed towards the meeting rooms, Steve took to the opposite direction to not catch any attention he had anything to do with the weapons inspector most of the NEST team had targeted as Galloway's 'henchman'. He breathed in relief to see at least one familiar face on base, although they were going to fight one another. Like the Con alias Uncle Jack was given by his dad, the youth knew how much of an opportunist Uncle Jack was and when he saw something he could get to, he wasn't going to let go, and didn't mind waiting at any opening opportunity at a mark/meal. Just like a vulture.

_I hope Sam's going to last against him._

Steve wouldn't be surprised if the Autobot Ambassador did give up.

_He _was_ trained by Dad personally._

Not that many people knew of it, meetings with the con family were always done carefully or at least in a private area where access was limited to the public but didn't catch the attention of authorities. Jack wasn't your typical lobbyist; he was the type that resorted to nearly just about any method to get whatever he wanted. Steve pretty much was acquainted with all the methods the lobbyist liked to use with all those times Uncle Jack visited his family, so he wasn't worried at all about going against him.

But the problem lay with all the others who were at the base.

Sam, the army people, and even the of staff of NEST, and even the Autobots have no idea.

More importantly, Sideswipe.

Sure, Steve did give a warning to his uncle about the mech's temper – it didn't mean that it was going to stop the lobbyist from doing the real damage on the negotiations part. Steve scratched his head and thought that maybe being with the mech more might help Sideswipe trust him more about dealing with his uncle as the weapons inspector that everyone believed he was 'evil'. If he held on his own, then Sides could avoid attacking another human.

When Steve made it outside, he spotted his guardian rolling to the front of him in his sliver Corvette alt-form. "Hey Sides, how's everything?"

"Boring," the mech sighed. "Always the usual patrol, but a soldier's gotta do it."

"If it's okay with you, can I join you?" Steve asked. He then added, "If you could use a person to talk you out of your boredom that is."

Perking up at the idea will make his boredom disappear and he could do his job as a guardian at the same time, Sideswipe welcomed him in by opening the door. The human complied by going in his interior.

"You doing okay?" Sides asked as he scanned Steve as soon the human stepped in and they were driving away on base.

Steve scowled at the dashboard, "Could you warn me when you do that?" He slightly shuddered at the feeling as his memory of being scanned by the medic jump into his head.

"Sorry, I was requested by Big Boss and Hatchet to check every few breems on your condition. Just following orders." the mech said apologetically. He sighed, "I heard from the other bots you met our new annoyance on base."

The youth didn't look happy about it either going with the way he should be acting, "No kidding, the first instant he meets me I get a card from him." A sarcastic laugh. He then acted an impersonation of the inspector, "Need anything? Just _call_ me."

"Then you burnt the card?" Sideswipe asked knowing what happened.

Steve rolled his eyes, "It's dead weight, Sideswipe. Like hell he's going to help me in finding my twin without a consequence. I'd have to go against you guys. And seriously – I'd rather not have the _Lazaros_ in the hands of a guy like him."

A snarl came from the warrior, "If he even thinks about making you join Galloway, he's in for trouble with me."

Holding his hands up in a peaceful gesture, Steve tried to ease the Autobot down, "Easy Sides, I know you really want to slice him up literally – But – I'd rather not you get into trouble. I mean – you getting in trouble by Galloway was already a nightmare. Don't need to add more oil to the roaring bon fire."

"What do you suggest we do?" the mech asked. Sideswipe never liked going into the political side of the war, but with Steve being his charge – he found he was starting to respect Bumblebee who was Sam's guardian.

"Nothing for now," Steve replied calmly. "NEST isn't really in a condition to do anything at the moment. Not after Soundwave's attack, I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's writing reports on it. We might as well endure for now."

Sideswipe was slightly startled at his charge's reaction. "You seem awfully calm after yesterday's events."

Steve's face turned to an uncomfortable look, "On the inside, I'm freaked out with the whole situation just as everyone is. I'm just doing what I can after what I've done to my twin. I just – can't shake off that feeling Skyler's angry with you guys."

"I'm sure it's just a misunderstanding, Steve," Sides said trying to cheer up Steve. "Maybe he's only aware that you were hurt. As stupid as it sounds, it's just like elder twins to worry to the point of extreme. There are some points back then that even Sunny misunderstood and he usually takes it out on the other bots when I get hurt." A pause. "My twin lashes out before he thinks it through thoroughly, but that's the way he is."

"Skyler's quite the opposite in a way. That's what I'm worried about. He figures everything out before he usually comes up with a conclusion – I'm afraid he's going to get it wrong somehow." Steve argued lightly. "He sort of takes details to the extreme."

"Why's that?" the Autobot asked incredulously. Why would Skyler go to the extreme just didn't made sense in his processor.

"Because of me," the hacker sighed. "You can imagine how easily I pick up things and memorize them without a fault? Skyler's kept up with me to the point he's good at many things by being an info junkie." It was a memory the hacker didn't like how they were always compared to each other at school. His elder twin had to work extra hard in setting a right example to his younger siblings. Steve pointed out, "He's not as sharp in the memory department like me, but his analyzing skills and his perception is way better than mine."

The mech thought of Jazz and Ironhide who were now with both the Major and the Sergeant. "You know he's going to make it difficult for Major Lennox and Sergeant Epps to find any information at finding him, right?" The youth nod in turn. "I think they might have convincing issues if they ever meet your brother without you."

"Is there a way I could meet Skyler somehow if they ever find him to help convincing him to help NEST?" Steve hoped at the thought of meeting Skyler.

Sideswipe was silent for a while before he answered, "Sorry Steve, but I don't think Optimus or any of the higher ups are going to let you off base for some time. After you made Soundwave back off, the Decepticons would be in hot pursuit looking for you."

Steve was disappointed to hear that, he wanted to complain but managed to stop himself. He knew placing more problems on Sideswipe wasn't a good idea. The idea of making another prank while NEST wasn't in a good situation was unthinkable. Thinking about the idea that he had Uncle Jack as his means of other Intel was probably his only motivation right now. He wondered if he could somehow contact the others in his con family through the lobbyist, but shook out of it. It was a bad idea – having Uncle Robert known by the government was enough and he didn't want to drag the whole family in.

What now? The hacker shifted through his memories to think of something to do to distract him from boredom.

"Hey, Sideswipe?"

"What is it, Steve?" Sides answered back as his charge suddenly had a different look on his face.

"Are the training grounds still going on with the training?" Steve asked. He then looked to his watch. "You have a training session in like 10 minutes or so right?"

The bot was silent as he shuttered his optics. "Don't tell me you memorized my schedule."

The hacker laughed, "I know nearly all the schedules of the Autobots and some of the soldiers off by heart already. It's hard for me to forget."

_Scarp. I forgot about that. _Sideswipe was going to have to get used to Steve's ability. "So why'd you ask?"

"I never got to actually see the training going on around base," Steve shrugged. "Not like I have much to do anyway, Simmons is off with Sam for more UN negotiations with Prowl."

At the thought that Steve might enjoy a few explosions as well a good fight with his commander who was on base, Sides smirked inwardly. "You'll be in for a treat, Steve. I'm going to battle Big Boss today."

Steve now looked interested about his current guardian fighting with the Autobot CO, "You can handle a huge bot like him?"

"You haven't seen anything yet!" Sideswipe said happily as he drove towards the training grounds.

The hacker smiled at his guardian's enthusiastic behavior to fight his own commander, perhaps today wasn't going to be so boring after all.

* * *

_At Denver…_

Aww! He's soooo cuuuute!" Darlita squealed cuddling the sparkling in her arms. "Can I keep him?"

Flipluck on the other hand was purely embarrassed looking bashfully away from her. This was the first time a human cuddled him. The fact Cathy who had a thing for cute things was stroking the bundle of wires on the head only made him purr.

Sunstreaker still quiet in his alt-form felt disgusted. _Like Pit I want any organic femmes on me._ He wouldn't even process about anyone touching him and ruining his paint job. However on a tactical point of view, he did approve of the sparkling taking all the attention so the femmes could somehow be a part of their plan in getting rid of Mindwipe and Shriller.

The con man not too far away was inwardly rolling his eyes, as he realized a little too late, that the girls did have an affinity for anything cute. What he didn't expect was that it included alien toddlers or sparklings. In a way he was glad to introduce Flipluck first, rather than Sunstreaker. He had explained everything as well as every place he had been since his departure from Louisiana. Seeing they were taking it well, that left the introductions for the mech.

It was Catherine that was first to realize that they were one person short. "Where's Flipluck's caretaker? Should he be around?" When Skyler put his hand on the hood of the car he was touching she understood. "He's the car?"

To the surprise of the girls a male voice came out of the car, "Hmph. _Finally_ someone figures out I'm the car and not hiding in it."

Darlita was shocked. She had seen many robotic works in her field but to think the alien was disguised as a car was something else entirely. "You've been listening in on us all along?"

A snort. "Do you see any _other_ car here?" The red head shook her head. "That's your answer."

Darlita wasn't finished yet. Taking note on the mech's alternative form of a car to Flipluck that was just an automatic card shuffler, she blurted out, "How tall are you in your – uh – other form?"

This time the Autobot couldn't care less about real introductions and immediately transformed without giving any warnings to the humans. He made sure when his full form was up, his head did not collide with the roof. The girls were stunned to see his current form their mouths wide open. "This form is what we call bi-pedal form."

Cathy couldn't help but feel amazed, hell, she had seen a lot of weird things from her family con gatherings; but this Autonomous Robotic Organism took the number one spot. She was slightly afraid of 'him' since the bot was large and putting on her flight reflex. However, as she saw Flipluck run over to the mech and begin hugging his wheels, he didn't seem to look as frightening as seconds went by. The demolition girl she noted seemed to find the bot as a new idol as her eye in a sense looked like they were twinkling in finding a new toy. Cathy wasn't surprised as her work did relate to robotics in some way.

Turning to her con brother, Cathy asked, "Skyler? What's the problem you're facing here in Denver?"

There was a frown on Skyler's face, "We've got two Decepticons in the city, their abilities are giving us problems, and we're at a disadvantage. We need to get rid of them before we leave the city and head for Salt Lake City." He was glad enough the girls were taking Sunstreaker well; he thought they'd really freak out like his uncle.

"But with Lita's explosives she needs to get rid of, all we need is the place and plans to execute it," Cathy listed off the things they could do next.

"That's the general idea," the con man agreed.

Darlita to the surprise of everyone jumped for joy, "You guys! I owe you big time! YES! I finally get to see things go boom!" She then muttered about how she was going to use her stock to the fullest ramblingly to the point that no one understood her.

Two Cybertronians and the other two humans blinked in an awkward silence.

"So," Sunstreaker raised his voice slightly as he was somewhat trying to get everyone back to the main problem. All of them finally had their eyes on him. His attention was the femme that had the con alias as 'Fuse'. "Where are your explosives?"

The red head replied, "Back at one of the warehouses I rented. The whole stock's there."

Skyler looked at Cathy in question.

"Don't look at me that way, Sky. I have no idea about her explosives, I just dropped in Denver today remember?" Cathy made her point clear.

The con man shrugged, "You never know." A pause. "Well, one way to find out." He then gave the demolitions expert an interested look. "How about we take a drive to your rented warehouse?"

"Snake and Charm Speaker," Darlita announced proudly, "You won't regret working with me."

* * *

_Minutes Later…_

They arrived at the warehouse in one piece. Not that anything happened on the roads as they drove towards their intended location, but the fact they managed to pass by the two Decepticons without getting detected was another stroke of luck. With Sunstreaker having three human passengers and having an alt-form that was blue he passed by them without too much trouble.

Like always, the Decepticons didn't seem to think about their alt-forms as a good disguise missing the parts where humans would consider the details in an odd way. Shriller was a TV broadcasting van minus the reporters plus the crew and Mindwipe simply flew overhead as a matching media but in a guise of a news copter that was not a local channel. Oddly enough, the Decepticon symbols were clear as day on their bodies. According to Sunstreaker's scans they seemed to be scouting the northern side of the city which was the opposite direction they were heading to.

To Sunstreaker's relief, the warehouse was tall enough for him to change into his bi-pedal form without hitting his head on the roof and as it was an enclosed space he freely could be in his true form with no worry. He rolled in carefully and scanned around to see what the femme had in store. There was a car that was parked covered by a hood which didn't interest the mech. When he got to the explosives he was relived what they were looking for.

"Seems all the explosives are in order," the mech said gruffly.

Cathy blinked at that, "How do you know there are explosives here? The whole place is covered with sheets."

"I scanned the place," Sunny said and turning off into another direction where the sparkling run off to, leaving no room for reply. He did not want Flipluck to touch anything that might accidentally explode, avoiding interacting with the femme was a bonus.

The female con artist gave an odd look to Skyler hinting the mech.

He shrugged, "That's the way Sunstreaker is. He's not really the social type."

Cathy nodded at that and helped with uncovering the sheets with both Skyler and Darlita. She read what her side read after she uncovered her sheets, "We got TNT, AMFO, C4s, and… grenade launchers?" She gave the other girl with a horrified look, "Girl, what are you trying to do? Go all 'terrorist' on the Mark?"

The girl with her Con alias as 'Fuse' easily shrugged it off doing an 'evil' smile. "Never know when you're prepared or not."

Looking at all of those things uncovered by his side of the sheets, Skyler's attention was on one point. "Are those rocket launchers?" he pointed.

Darlita smiled as she skipped over and picked one up. "Yup! A beauty isn't she?"

"Even if you used them in Keith's previous heist, it'd still be overkill, Lita," Skyler muttered as he silently agreed with Cathy. The hacker now knew why 'Ghost' wasn't all that sure to use her explosives. It didn't fit in with his stealth escapes. Darlita definitely had taken the insanity level further than he expected.

"But these little babies are going to solve your problem, right?" Lita said with glee. Stroking the rocket launcher lovingly and looking at the rest of explosives in the room with caring eyes she said, "Let's get all of you ready to blow some big bad bots to bits!"

Sunstreaker couldn't help but twitch at the femme's crazed antics for explosives with Flipluck in one hand. The sparkling was giggling to himself, being distracted yet again in trying to solve a card trick that this time Cathy taught him.

"You know what, Skyler?"

"Hmm?"

"I think now I'm starting to question her sanity," the mech commented.

Skyler shook his head as he laughed, "Be glad you only know half of it."

Sunstreaker rolled his optics. _Pit-spawned femme, thank Primus Wheeljack and her won't ever meet._

The warrior was just glad enough it was the 'Cons that were going to get a taste of the explosives, and not him.

* * *

_Autobot Mission Log Entry 3.04__: Working on the Hunt with Con Femmes_

_Denver, Colorado, US._

_In a city with two Decepticons with their communications system fully online was probably the worst slag we've gotten into so far. Not to mention we had a sparkling with us and both Decepticons were Mindwipe and Shriller. Those two weren't pure front-line warriors, more of the support soldiers for the fighters._

_Getting them as a set together was fragging bad luck I tell you._

_For some reason I had theory that Primus was giving us all the bad luck in the universe of getting into an enemy scout's territory._

_Skyler on the other hand had his own con family problems, since my twin Sideswipe had taken Steve with him, he got into trouble with his cousin Rachel. He even got slapped for it, which he accepted it. I didn't understand why he did; I suppose it was out of respect since he could not tell her. The Pit I understand with human relations! I didn't understand why he was afraid by a bunch of femmes._

_He then corrected me they were 'Femme Con Artists'._

_The only thing I did understand was the fact that in a con family, con femmes were not to be underestimated or trifled with recklessly._

_I was certain of the organic by the name of Cathy, on how she worked with Skyler when I spied on her back before I kidnapped him. She by no doubt had a type of advantage on male fleshlings around her like a magnet and was confident in using it to her ends. The other femme I was not sure about at first._

_To the horror of my spark, I found that this femme demolitions/explosives expert wasn't what she seemed._

_She made Wheeljack look docile with his explosives with the way she was treating (hugging and stroking them with love) the bombs like they were her younglings._

_While her body vitals showed nothing on my scanners, I was sure she was clinically insane when it came to explosives._

_I'd rather not get near her if I have to, and by Primus; I was not going to keep Flipluck anywhere near her explosives. Wheeljack did explosives testing because he wants to see effective results. The femme? She just wanted to see things explode for the fun of it. She was like a Wheeljack being a trigger happy Ironhide, add in an obsession to see something explode._

_That night, the humans decided to stay overnight in the warehouse to plan on getting rid of the Decepticons we were facing. I wasn't shocked to see that they were declaring Skyler as their current group leader, but the fact that both femmes were ganging up to defeat him in a decision making was funny._

_Uh – Not that I'd tell anyone that – Like Pit I would._

_I was also curious why they had these 'Con aliases'. I thought in the previous hunt that they were just temporary code names, but it seems not. I understood why the femme Cathy was called 'Charm Speaker' and Darlita was called 'Fuse'. What I didn't understand was the fact Skyler had the alias 'Snake'. What did he have to do with an organic limbless species?_

_I had yet to see how the con family worked, but con aliases were like a designation when you were in the Con family. That night when Skyler mentioned that Robert proclaimed I was actually welcomed to the family, the femmes were all in to get me a con alias as well. I didn't really care about it but they were persistent about it._

_I just hope it didn't sound stupid._

_Other than that, having more explosives and allies for Decepticon hunting turned the tide in our favor._

_It was about time we did the second hunt for Decepticons._

_~ Sunny_

* * *

**_TBC..._**

**_  
_**

  



End file.
